[ad_1]
- CERN’s new super collider will be eight times more powerful than the world’s largest and most powerful LHC.
- Physicists may be able to use this to solve mysteries about the nature of the universe.
- Based on current timelines, the first stage of the new collider could be operational by 2045.
For decades, physicists have been colliding particles to peel back the layers of the universe. However, despite all this research, we still don’t know what that 5% of the universe is made of.
Particle physics research will need a major upgrade to begin exploring the mysterious 95% made up of dark matter and dark energy.
CERN, the European Council for Nuclear Research, is building a new super collider called the Future Circular Collider (FCC) to push the boundaries of modern physics research and perhaps discover the mostly invisible true nature of the universe. I am designing.
Based on CERN’s timeline, this giant atomic destroyer could be partially operational by 2045.
It is three times larger and about 100 times more efficient than the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest and most powerful collider.
“With this new machine, we can reproduce 11 years’ worth of physics data obtained with the old machine in about two minutes,” said Michael Benedict, a CERN accelerator physicist who led the FCC’s feasibility study. Ta.
It’s not just about replicating data. With FCC, physicists hope to tackle some of the most daunting questions in their field.
solve the mysteries of the universe
What happened in the first moments after the Big Bang? What is the true nature of dark matter? Where did the antimatter go?
“There are so many important questions that we don’t know how to answer,” said Christophe Grojean, a DESY theoretical particle physicist who also works on the FCC. “We need to find an explanation.”
Particle collider helps with this. Colliders send particles spinning around a ring at nearly the speed of light, causing the particles to collide with each other and reveal their properties.
CERN has already accomplished many things with the LHC, including the discovery of the Higgs boson. The identification of the Higgs boson was a major step toward understanding weak nuclear interactions. Weak nuclear interactions are a fundamental force in the universe that keeps the sun shining and are extremely important.
But now physicists want to look deeper into the Higgs boson to uncover its physics. Doing so could deepen our understanding of dark matter, a mysterious substance that makes up about 85% of the universe.
Although we cannot see dark matter, scientists can detect its gravitational influence on galaxies and its distribution throughout the universe. Understanding the properties of dark matter is key to understanding how galaxies form and grow.
To make that happen and investigate other big questions, CERN needs a supercollider with even higher levels of precision and efficiency than the LHC.
FCC will exist in two phases
In the first construction phase, CERN plans to build an electron-positron collider called FCC-ee.
The collider, also known as the “Higgs Factory,” will produce Higgs particles at extremely high velocities and collect data with 10 to 100 times more precision than the LHC, Feasibility Study Leader Benedict said. told BI.
In the second phase, CERN plans to upgrade FCC-ee to a proton collider called FCC-hh. This collider will push the limits even further.
With eight times the energy potential of the LHC, the FCC-hh “discovery machine” could reveal fundamental forces and particles never before observed.
Together, these two collider could bring new frontiers of physics research. But first CERN needs to build it.
break new ground
CERN plans to build a 56-mile-long FCC tunnel beneath France and Switzerland, surrounding the city of Geneva.
If all goes well with the feasibility study and permitting process, tunnel construction is expected to begin in the early 2030s and be completed around 2040.
Next, CERN will install an FCC-ee collider inside the tunnel. The first stage collider could be operational by 2045, Benedict said.
Building a super collider is not an easy task, both economically and logistically. Construction of the first phase alone will cost about $15 billion. CERN collaborates with experts from 150 universities and research institutes around the world to design and plan the FCC.
“The FCC is not an agency that a few people can do on their own. We really need to work together,” Grosjean said.
Both Benedict and Grosjean believe that consolidating this network has value beyond the FCC.
“We’ve been able to ally communities that wouldn’t necessarily necessarily talk to each other otherwise,” Benedict said. “The value of this link between academia and industry is difficult to quantify, but the level of impact on society is enormous.”
[ad_2]
Source link
