The SSC status and outlook

The proposed Superconducting Super Collider is a high luminosity proton-proton collider designed to provide collisional energies at least an order of magnitude greater that those presently available at existing high energy physics facilities, or a maximum center-of-mass energy of 40 TeV. It will, thereby, be able to probe the 1--2 TeV scale -- a frontier energy region believed to be replete with new physics. The technical feasibility of this ambitious undertaking is largely the result of recent advances in superconducting magnet technology. These advances, moreover, are the fruit of a nation-wide R ampersand D program, now in its fourth year, being coordinated by the SSC Central Design Group. The project is now well into the conceptual design stage. Development of technical sub-systems has begun. President Reagan has recently announced his support of the project, and congressional hearings on the matter have started. 5 refs., 6 figs