Hadron Collider
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The Large Hadron Collider is smashing protons together again
It's been a long wait, but finally CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is back doing what it does best: smashing protons together. The machine was effectively shut down for two years while engineers in Switzerland carried out important upgrades. Scientists started firing proton beams again back in April, but avoided any collisions while they checked the new components were working properly. Now, CERN has announced that it's carrying out proton-proton collisions again. The beams are being fired at a lower energy of 450 gigaelectronvolts (GeV), however, so that CERN can check its particle detection systems are firing correctly. The plan is to ramp up the LHC so it can handle dual proton beams at 6.5 TeV - almost double what it was operating at before the shutdown -- for 13 TeV collisions later this summer. The Higgs boson was discovered last time, so we're hoping something equally remarkable is uncovered during its sophomore season.
15 Minutes of Fame: Searching for the Higgs boson and a Swift White Hawkstrider
From Hollywood celebrities to the guy next door, millions of people have made World of Warcraft a part of their lives. How do you play WoW? We're giving each approach its own 15 Minutes of Fame. We interrupt our two-part interview with actor Kristian Nairn (Hodor in HBO's blockbuster new series, Game of Thrones) for a quick chat with ... a particle physicist at CERN, the world's largest particle physics laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland. Writes in-game buddy Fra (and thanks, Fra -- much love for all the EU players who brave the whole second language thing to send in tips!), "I have a friend which might be material for one of your interviews (which are great!). He is both good as a healer as he is a physicist. He also does some guides and public talks about his studies, and he is comprehensible even for a dumbass as me. :) I'm pretty sure you've a lot of nerds on your interview list, but a physicist working in one of the most famous labs is something ... new? He also does a lot of jokes about the not-so-good physics in game, or when people care of maximizing numbers that do not really change your game performance if you do all the math." A particle physicist who isn't into theorycrafting? We simply had to know more. Follow us past the break to learn how searching for the Higgs boson is like farming for a Swift White Hawkstrider (and come back next week for more with Game of Thrones' Kristian Nairn).
Large Hadron Collider to run at half-power until end of 2010
After a series of setbacks, delays, and potential world-ending mishaps, it seems that the scientists at CERN have decided to take it easy with the Large Hadron Collider, and have announced that they plan to operate it at an energy of 3.5 TeV (or trillion electron volts) per beam when they start it up again in November of this year. If that goes well, they'll then cautiously ramp things up to 5 TeV per beam, before starting to shoot for a full 7 TeV per beam by the end of 2010. So, mark your calendars... while you still can.
Large Hadron Collider restart, end of the world pushed back to mid-November
Still undecided about what to do with those precious few months before the biggest doomsday since Y2K? Then you're in luck, 'cause the much anticipated / feared restart of the Large Hadron Collider has now been delayed yet again, almost exactly a month after the last delay. This time it looks like a couple of vacuum leaks are the culprit, and CERN says that the collider is now unlikely to restart before mid-November, which just so happens to coincide with the peak of the Leonids meteor shower. Coincidence? Yes, yes it is.
Scientists get death threats over Large Hadron Collider
Really people, enough is enough. Death threats? Seriously? According to a fresh report from the Telegraph, gurus working on the mysterious Large Hadron Collider are receiving all sorts of strange messages, e-mails and faxes as the go-live date (this Wednesday, supposedly) draws ever closer. For those curious about why some folks are up in arms over this thing, we'll simply point you to this very informational rap video; for those opposed to nerdy hip-hop, let's just say its primary goal is to "seek out new particles including the long-awaited Higgs boson responsible for making things weigh what they do and the possible source of gravity called dark matter." Somehow or another, the paranoid among us think that carrying out those tasks will rip the world wide open or leave you stuck in 1990 with nothing in your CD player but Ice Ice Baby. Okay, so maybe that last scenario is worth getting worked up about.[Via TGDaily]
