The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is hailed as the most potent particle accelerator globally. Constructed by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), it resides within a 27-km (17-mile) circular tunnel, previously home to the Large Electron-Positron Collider (LEP), buried 50–175 metres (165–575 feet) belowground on the France-Switzerland border.
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Operational testing of the LHC commenced on September 10, 2008. However, an electrical glitch in its cooling system on September 18 caused a significant temperature rise in the magnets, designed for operation near absolute zero (-273.15 °C or -459.67 °F). Initial hopes for swift repairs were overly optimistic. It resumed operations on November 20, 2009, surpassing Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory’s Tevatron as the most powerful accelerator by propelling protons to energies of 1.18 teraelectron volts (TeV; 1 × 10¹² electron volts) on November 30. In March 2010, CERN scientists announced a flaw in the LHC’s superconducting wire design, necessitating operation at half-energy (7 TeV). Shut down in February 2013 for rectification, it restarted at full capacity (13 TeV) in April 2015. A subsequent extended shutdown, focused on upgrading the LHC’s equipment, began in December 2018 and concluded in July 2022.
The central component of the LHC is a circular ring situated within the circumference of the LEP tunnel. This ring is just a few centimeters wide, maintained at a vacuum level surpassing deep space and chilled to within two degrees of absolute zero. Within this ring, two opposing beams of heavy ions or protons are accelerated to speeds approaching one-millionth of a percent of the speed of light. (Protons fall into the category of heavy subatomic particles called hadrons, from which the particle accelerator derives its name.) At four specific points along the ring, the beams intersect, resulting in a fraction of particles colliding with each other. At maximum capacity, proton collisions reach energies of up to 13 TeV, nearly seven times higher than previous achievements. Each collision point houses massive magnets weighing tens of thousands of tons and arrays of detectors to capture particles generated by these collisions.
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One objective of the LHC initiative is to delve into the fundamental makeup of matter by recreating the intense conditions present during the initial moments of the universe as per the big-bang theory. Physicists have long relied on the standard model of fundamental particles, which has proven effective but also reveals certain shortcomings. Foremost among these is its inability to account for why certain particles possess mass. In the 1960s, British physicist Peter Higgs proposed the existence of a particle that, during the universe’s early stages, interacted with other particles, endowing them with mass. This hypothetical particle, known as the Higgs boson, had never been observed before as it could only emerge from collisions at energy levels previously inaccessible in experiments pre-LHC.
