Editing Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (section)

==Possible closure under flat nuclear science budget scenarios==
In late 2012, the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee (NSAC) was asked to advise the Department of Energy's Office of Science and the National Science Foundation how to implement the nuclear science long range plan written in 2007, if future nuclear science budgets continue to provide no growth over the next four years. In a narrowly decided vote, the NSAC committee showed a slight preference, based on non-science related considerations,<ref>
{{cite web
 |title=NSAC Charges / Reports
 |publisher=Nuclear Science Advisory Committee
 |url=http://science.energy.gov/np/nsac/reports/
}}</ref> for shutting down RHIC rather than canceling the construction of the [[Facility for Rare Isotope Beams]] (FRIB).<ref>
{{cite journal
 |author1=J. Matson
 |date=31 January 2013
 |title=Decelerating American Physics: Panel Advises Shutdown of Last U.S. Collider
 |url=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=tribble-panel-rhic-closure
 |journal=[[Scientific American]]
 |access-date=2013-02-02
}}</ref>

By October 2015, the budget situation had improved, and RHIC continued operations into the next decade.<ref>
{{cite journal
 |author1=D. Castelvecchi
 |year=2015
 |title=Neutrino study made key priority for US nuclear physics
 |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]]
 |volume=526 |issue=7574 |page=485
 |bibcode=2015Natur.526..485C
 |doi=10.1038/526485a
 |pmid=26490595
|doi-access=free
 }}</ref>