Thread: The Large Hadron Collider

Originally Posted by Chimensch

OK, I stand corrected ... and I'm happy for your grandfather, but what's clean about nuclear energy? It's dangerous (Chernobyl) and leaves a lot of waste that we still don't know what to do with.

Chernobyl is what happens if people do stupid things. Like manually disable all safety elements (by removing them or mechanically blocking them), driving the reactor knowingly beyond its design limits, ignoring anybody who argued against it, and then at the very last instant performing an action which was known to increase the reaction first before slowing it, rather than slowing it immediately.

Chernobyl is a sad testament to what happens if people with authority violate every rule in the book, only to see what happens.

As the Americans say: Guns don't kill people, people kill people.

But bruno, there's still a point there despite a poor example. 3 mile island? these accidents do happen.

But then textile factories are a haven of fire, refineries explode, and tankers spill oil into the ocean. A nuclear plant is safe enough to be considered an acceptable risk at their current disaster rate in my opinion.

Brings back fond memories of what I like in rap, I'm not so big on what most make today.

PS: I can't be the only one thinking "Large Hardon Collider" am I?

Originally Posted by Chady

PS: I can't be the only one thinking "Large Hardon Collider" am I?

Sounds kind of gay

I think that whatever comes from this thing will be pretty cool, since I highly doubt a black hole is going to pop out. My faith is enough to let me not worry about that. Here's hoping for some crazy cool technology that let's us have VR video game systems!

Originally Posted by Nickelking

But bruno, there's still a point there despite a poor example. 3 mile island? these accidents do happen.

True. And though the actual pollution of the accident were not that significant, it ruined the image of nuclear power as a source of energy.

But nuclear reactor design has improved greatly over the last decades, and if it is safe enough for the nimitz type carriers and nuclear subs, then it can be safe enough for civilian use.

All I have to say is: HIGGS!!!!!!!!!

That d@*%^ little particle will be one of the biggest steps forward in understanding our existence, I for one CANNOT WAIT!!!!!!!!

Oh, did I mention they'll be able to recreate conditions analogous to those in the first billionths of a second after the birth of the Universe? Because they will.

And about the black holes; yes, it's a possibility, but they will be on the nano-scale or smaller and will not be stable enough to do any damage.

I'm kind of an amateur particle physics enthusiast, so this is more than a little exciting for me.

Just my 2 cents and then I'll be gone. The idea that science and research are bad is not new. Yet without it we wouldn't be having this forum or the computers, or for that matter even the straight razors. We would be grubbing for food.

For that matter I wouldn't be grubbing for food since without the basic science and research my cardiac bypass surgery would never have taken place.

I was working in the nuclear industry at the time of Three Mile Island. I was an uranium exploration geologist and the incident received quite a bit of coverage in the various trade journals. The amount of radiation released was insignificant. The dosage comparison was that it was similar to the radiation you would receive if you worked in a brick building. (How many people know that because of the clay, bricks give off radiation?? Potasium-40). I also recall that the press was severely censored for their coverage. In part that was due to set up photos such as asking everybody to get off the street so that a picture of the "deserted town" could be placed on the front page of the newspapers.

Anyway, science can and will be used for purposes that we might otherwise wish. However, much beneficial progress has been made as an offshoot of war; radar is but one example. Personally, I look forward to the results of the collider. I suspect and hope that breakthroughs in sub-atomic physics will bring radical improvements to our future selves.

OK, done venting - carry on ladies and gentlemen.

I find it odd that there is a rap, but I'm glad that the video has lead to a discussion of science in general.

For about two and a half years, I was working with simulation data from the LHC at FermiLab and by remotely accessing their computers from my university. It was quite interesting for the first year and a half or so, but later turned into a big software/bugtesting project and I subsquently gave up the work. (I'll not go into details about that because that would be in extremely poor taste.) But as a result, I know a fair bit about the accelerators at Fermi and CERN, as well as how the scientists work and what they are looking for.

I feel it is worth mentioning that black holes do form inside the accelerators, but since black holes are so widely misunderstood, this fact has aroused some concert. Black holes decay at a rate which is dependent on their mass; I don't have the equation on hand, otherwise I'd be happy to post it. As a result, the black holes that are created in the accelerators pose absolutely no threat to anybody. It is also worth mentioning that black holes are formed in out atmosphere by high energy particles colliding with the atmosphere, though those black holes don't seem to receive much press. Examining particles created from high energy collisions in the atmosphere was a precursor to man-made accelerators, and a number of useful experiments can still be performed with such observations. Not that I would consider it useful, but in an advanced laboratory course I took, one of the available experiments involved measuring the lifetime of the muons created by cosmic rays.

I would also like to add in that there have been quite a few spin-off technologies that have been developed from accelerators, most notably the microwave. There is also an area at FermiLab that treats cancer with neutrons.

Oh, one other thing; there are highly active (radioactive, that is) areas around any non-linear accelerator (I would say all accelerators, but I'm only certain about non-linear ones). The main area is where they "dump" the "beam" in case anything should go wrong. The beam is what the stream of particles going around inside the accelerator is called. Dumping is exactly what it sounds like; the beam is forced out of it's normal path and into the ground in a gives spot. An example of something that could go wrong: the beam somehow moves out of it's intended path and begins to run into any of the various things just outside its path (there are tons of electronics, magnets, cooling elements etc). If you think one bad stroke on a hone is bad, imagine a stream of particles upwards of 99% of the speed of the light even just grazing any material.

Oh, one more thing. Now that I've started watching the "rap," it's nice to see that my work is referenced, though I don't really want to say what it was, due to the above bit about bug-testing.

99.9999991% of the speed of light is the target speed for the hadron "bunches." (for those who don't know and are impressed by big numbers)

As for applicable scientific advancements; the LHC should expand our understanding of anti-matter which could advance medical imaging technologies. A PET scan uses positrons (anti-electrons) to make a 3-D map of some part of the body that needs to be inspected, so more sophisticated uses for anti-matter could be just as beneficial.

Wow, there's a ton of people here who actually know what the hell the LHC does. I know a little, but nothing intimate like you eggheads