As far as the tile roofs, they last a long time. It isn't the tile that is the issue, it's the felt (or paper) underneath that gets replaced. Mine is 25 years old, has not been replaced yet. Some neighbors have had theirs redone, but many have not as yet. 04-06-2011, 12:00 AM.
Smaller particle accelerators are used in a wide variety of applications, including particle therapy for oncological purposes, radioisotope production for medical diagnostics, ion implanters for manufacture of semiconductors, and accelerator mass spectrometers for measurements of rare isotopes such as radiocarbon.
The work is all part of an $8 billion project at the international physics laboratory called CERN. At its heart will be an enormously powerful particle accelerator capable of smashing subatomic particles together, reproducing the energies that existed a fraction of a second after the big bang.