Friday, November 5, 2010

LHC researchers 'set to create a mini-Big Bang'

Simulated lead-lead collisionResearchers at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) are getting set to create the Big Bang on a miniature scale.

Since 2009, the world's highest-energy particle accelerator has been smashing together protons, in a bid to shed light on the fundamental nature of matter.

But now the huge machine will be colliding lead ions instead.

The experiments are planned for early November and will run for four weeks. ...

"Although the tiny fireballs will only exist for a fleeting moment (less than a trillionth of a trillionth of a second) the temperatures will reach over ten trillion degrees, a million times hotter than the centre of the Sun," said Dr Evans.

"At the temperatures generated, even protons and neutrons, which make up the nuclei of the atoms, will melt, resulting in a hot, dense soup of quarks and gluons." ...

via BBC News - LHC researchers 'set to create a mini-Big Bang'.

Ah, here's how this could destroy the earth in 2012 even though the experiment takes place in November. ;-)

CERN LHC Black Holes and Strangelets - May Appear Years Later and Destroy World




No comments: