Geneva: The world's biggest atom-smasher,
which was shut down soon after its inauguration amid technical
faults, is set to restart this weekend, the European
Organisation for Nuclear Research said on Friday.
The first beam of sub-atomic particles are expected to be
injected into the Large Hadron Collider "early Saturday
morning," CERN spokesman James Gillies said to a news agency, while adding that the timing was not set in stone.
Nestled inside a 27-km long tunnel straddling the
Franco-Swiss border near Geneva, the LHC promises to unlock
scientific mysteries about the creation of the Universe and
the fundamental nature of matter.
But the machine was shut down just nine days after its
inauguration last September following a series of technical
faults. Since then, the LHC's components had been tested to an
energy equivalent of five teraelectronvolts at full power.
The maximum output of what is currently the largest
functioning collider in the world, at the Fermilab near
Chicago in the United States, is one teraelectronvolt.
CERN had said in August that upon its relaunch, the LHC
will run at 3.5 teraelectronvolts in order to allow its
operators to gain experience of running the machine.
The first data should be collected a few weeks after the
first particle beam is fired.
CERN said the partial power level will be kept until "a
significant data sample has been gathered" and ramped up
thereafter.
Bureau Report
First Published: Friday, November 20, 2009, 18:15