The Large Hadron Collider is the only game in town for particle physicists who are the people busy trying to determine the fundamental laws of the universe that apply to very small things. It had an accident and construction was delayed. The particle physicist community's existing toys have pretty much been used for all they're worth and the field is at a standstill until their new bigger and better toy comes on line. This is scheduled to happen May 2008.
Most importantly, the Large Hadron Collider should be able to resolve whether the most important element of the standard model of particle physics not yet established by experiment, called the Higgs boson, really exists as predicted in the most mainstream of the particle physics theories. If it's there, the standard model gets its crowning gem and lots of theoretical particle physics dies. If it isn't there, the standard model goes the way of Newton's Theory of Gravity, a useful approximation of historical value, but something that is clearly not exactly right. We should know how it turns out by 2010.
Let's hope the search for the Higgs boson doesn't produce the unexpected results of the 2005 Brookhaven NY experiment - mini black holes, mercifully short-lived.
ReplyDeleteThe CERN LHC, a particle accelerator of much greater size and power, could produce even more unexpected results. But we'll never know, since we will instantly be transported to an alternative 'brane', i.e. a parallel universe.
See my book blog http://moridura.blogspot.com
Mid-August 2008 now looks like the point at which the fun will begin with actually paticles starting to collide.
ReplyDeleteMy prediction: No Higgs boson, no gravitons, no extra dimensions, no supersymmetric particles and no WIMPS. Just exquisite confirmation of quantum chromodynamics as currently formulated.