Stoughton electron accelerator to close

Funding cuts proved too much to bear for the UW-Madison Synchrotron Radiation Center in Stoughton, a $50 million electron accelerator, which will close next week. The remaining staff of about a dozen people will lose their jobs. The SRC featured a baseball diamond-sized particle accelerator that was instrumental in a number of technological and medical improvements and attracted scientists from around the world. But the center lost $5 million in annual National Science Foundation funding — roughly 90% of its operating budget —as a result of budget cuts in 2011.