We hope this extra reach will allow us to tackle some of the big questions in particle physics. One of the main topics is dark matter. This seems to be a new type of particle spread through the entire universe. And with the LHC Run 2 we hope to make it in the lab for the first time. But if the Higgs boson is rare, dark matter is even rarer, and we will need to sort through a lot of collisions before having a hope of finding it.
Squeeze: The beams are fine-tuned, and focused at the four points around the LHC where they cross, and the experiments will record the collisions. Almost there. The experiments now need to wait for the all-clear before they can start recording, and we begin studying things that have never been seen before.
Still, many of the collisions will not be interesting, as the protons just smash apart without doing anything exciting. To make matters worse, the rare new particles we are looking for also tend to be very unstable, and decay too quickly to be seen directly. So the job of the experiments is to measure whatever particles do come out of a collision and try to reconstruct what happened, looking for evidence of something unusual.
As well as dark matter, there are many other ideas to test, such as supersymmetry , new gauge bosons, quantum black holes and heavy neutrinos, all of which we could reconstruct from the LHC collisions.
Part of the joy and pain of science is that a new discovery could come in a matter of days, or a matter of years. It consists of a kilometre ring of superconducting magnets with a number of accelerating structures to boost the energy of the particles along the way. The LHC consists of a kilometre ring of superconducting magnets with a number of accelerating structures to boost the energy of the particles along the way. Inside the accelerator, two high-energy particle beams travel at close to the speed of light before they are made to collide.
The beams travel in opposite directions in separate beam pipes — two tubes kept at ultrahigh vacuum. They are guided around the accelerator ring by a strong magnetic field maintained by superconducting electromagnets.
As for Einstein, he'd be rocking in the grave if he knew what was happening at CERN — that is, if his friends hadn't spread his ashes on the Delaware River in If you're ever vacationing in Geneva, you can tour CERN free, but be sure to visit the website first and submit a request.
Don't forget your passport or identity card. Also, leave your children under 13 for group tours at home, along with high-heeled shoes, sandals and flip flops. You can't smoke either [source: CERN ]. I reference Einstein not because I understand even a grain of what he's taught the world, but because today's scientists pretty much try to build upon Einstein's work. One of the things Einstein spent a lot time studying was how atoms and light behaved.
His theories ultimately led to the existence and discovery of the Higgs boson. Sign up for our Newsletter! Mobile Newsletter banner close.
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