within a magnetic field, the curvature of the path through the silicon allows physicists to calculate the momentum of the particle. More curvature means less momentum and vice versa. Layer 3: central outer tracker (COT) Outside of the silicon detector, the central outer tracker works in much the manner as the silicon detector as it is also used to track the paths of charged particles and is also located within a magnetic field. The COT, however, is not made of silicon. Silicon is tremendously expensive and is not practical to purchase in extreme quantities. COT is a gas chamber filled with tens of thousands of gold wires arranged in layers and argon gas. Two types of wires are used in the COT: sense wires and field wires. Sense wires are thinner and attract the electrons that are released by the argon gas as it is ionized. The field wires are thicker than the sense wires and attract the positive ions formed from the release of electrons. There are 96 layers of wire and each wire is placed approximately 3.86 mm apart from one another. As in the silicon detector, when a charged particle passes through the chamber it ionizes the gas. This signal is then carried to a nearby wire, which is then carried to the computers for read-out. The COT is approximately 3.1 m long and extends from r = 40 cm to r = 137 cm. Although the COT is not nearly as precise as the silicon detector, the COT has a hit position resolution of 140 μm and a momentum resolution of 0.0015 (GeV/c)−1. Layer 4: solenoid magnet The solenoid magnet surrounds both the COT and the silicon detector. The purpose of the solenoid is to bend the trajectory of charged particles in the COT and silicon detector by creating a magnetic field parallel to the beam. The solenoid has a radius of r=1.5 m and is 4.8 m in length. The curvature of the trajectory of the particles in the magnet field allows physicists to calculate the momentum of each of the particles. The higher the curvature, the lower the momentum and vice versa. Because the particles have such a high energy, a very strong magnet is needed to bend the paths of the particles. The solenoid is a superconducting magnet cooled by liquid helium. The helium lowers the temperature of the magnet to 4.7 K