CERN Update (aka Update on the end of the world)

So don’t get those “last day on earth” parties started just yet.

After running for about two weeks, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland shut down on the September 19 for repairs.  A press release announced on Sept. 23 that the next scheduled collisions would take place in Spring 2009.

A faulty electrical connection and helium (coolant) leak is to blame for the downtime.

Since the superconducting magnets have to be cooled to only 1.9 degrees above absolute zero, the maintenance crews need to heat up the components to room temperature to begin repairing any faults.

The process is scheduled to take three to four weeks and not finish in time for the annual winter maintenance.  Fuel costs prevent the scientists from running the beams in the winter.

The beams are designed to fire with seven times more energy and 30 times the intensity of any other proton beam ever constructed.

When scientists finally do get to smash these itty-bitty particles together, they hope to detect elementary particles that may make up most of the matter in the known universe as well as clues to extra dimensions and even those miniature (hopefully evaporating) black holes everyone was talking about.

The beams made a full rotation and anti-rotation on September 10, 2008, for the first time.