Yesterday the science news media and twitterverse were abuzz following a BBC News article announcing “LHC to shut down for a year to address design faults.” Readers – and the news outlets that frantically re-reported the BBC article – assumed that CERN had found a new problem with the LHC and announced an imminent shutdown. […]
From CERN: Outcome from Chamonix: Better in the long run
Last week, the Chamonix workshop once again proved its worth as a place where all the stakeholders in the LHC can come together, take difficult decisions and reach a consensus on important issues for the future of particle physics. The most important decision we reached last week is to run the LHC for 18 to […]
From CERN: The LHC is back
From CERN: Two circulating beams bring first collisions in the LHC
Geneva, 23 November 2009. Today the LHC circulated two beams simultaneously for the first time, allowing the operators to test the synchronization of the beams and giving the experiments their first chance to look for proton-proton collisions. With just one bunch of particles circulating in each direction, the beams can be made to cross in […]
Rethinking LHC-ILC connections
Director’s Corner 12 November 2009 Barry Barish Rethinking LHC–ILC connections The American Linear Collider Physics Group (ALCPG) workshop held in Albuquerque, New Mexico from 29 September to 3 October was one of our large ILC meetings that we hold twice a year. There was much in this meeting: the results of the Letter of Intent […]
CERN prepares for LHC commissioning
Director’s Corner 15 October 2009 Barry Barish CERN prepares for LHC commissioning Once again, the Large Hadron Collider at CERN is moving to centre stage. The LHC is the world’s largest and highest-energy particle accelerator designed to collide protons at energies of 7 TeV per beam. Just about one year ago, as commissioning of this […]
Spring-scrubbing the beam pipe
How CERN’s accelerator complex fights electron clouds
The ILC is not the only accelerator that has to struggle against electron clouds and their distracting effect on the particle beam. Even the Large Hadron Collider LHC at CERN may suffer from it, and tests on two of its pre-accelerators, the PS and the SPS, have already proven several techniques with which the electron-cloud […]
From CERN: CERN management confirms new LHC restart schedule
Geneva, 9 February 2009. CERN1 management today confirmed the restart schedule for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) resulting from the recommendations from last week’s Chamonix workshop. The new schedule foresees first beams in the LHC at the end of September this year, with collisions following in late October. A short technical stop has also been […]
First beam in the LHC
You can witness it even if you weren't there
Wednesday must have been one of the biggest days in science history. It certainly was the biggest day in particle physics for a long time coming – the first full beam around the LHC. The first protons completed the full circle at 10:28 am (less than an hour after first injection), and scientists in CERN’s […]
From CERN: First beam in the LHC – accelerating science
Geneva, 10 September 2008. The first beam in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN1 was successfully steered around the full 27 kilometres of the world’s most powerful particle accelerator at 10h28 this morning. This historic event marks a key moment in the transition from over two decades of preparation to a new era of scientific […]