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LHC Fully Documented Online

Posted by kdawson on from the twenty-seven-kilometers-of-documentation dept.

Physicser writes "Want to read every single technical detail of the design and construction of the Large Hadron Collider and its six detectors? The whole shebang — seven reports totaling 1600 pages, 115 MB, with contributions from 8000 scientists and engineers — has been published electronically by the Journal of Instrumentation, free to read without a subscription."

17 of 239 comments (clear)

  1. Want to read every single technical detail...? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Not particularly.

    1. Re:Want to read every single technical detail...? by jgeeky · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Beautiful pun, if that was your intention. So far, I don't think the other posters have gotten it. It was glorious!

      --
      in the immortal words of socrates, "i drank what?"
    2. Re:Want to read every single technical detail...? by davester666 · · Score: 5, Funny

      It's like a giant hula-hoop(TM), lying on the ground, with tiny bits of things forced to circle inside it until they collide with one another, which results in the Earth disappearing into a black hole.

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    3. Re:Want to read every single technical detail...? by numbware · · Score: 5, Funny

      Even better explained here.

      --
      I'm going to go create my own technology news site, with blackjack and hookers. You know what? Forget the news site.
  2. I would but.... by east+coast · · Score: 5, Informative

    It would be a great read if I was one of the ten people on the face of the planet who could actually understand every detail. Oh, sorry, that's the people who wrote it.

    I know it's going to get downloaded a ton of times and probably deleted before most readers ever get to the 3rd page, if it's even read at all.

    Save them poor guys some bandwidth, torrent it. Too many people are going to be wasting their resources with no serious intentions of reading the contents.

    --
    Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
    1. Re:I would but.... by Matt+Edd · · Score: 5, Insightful

      People should keep this kinda stuff in mind when bashing scientists (like intelligent design supporters, anti-vaccination people, and other alternative medicine supporters.) The experts in a field really are experts. The argument from authority fallacy only applies to people talking outside of their field.

    2. Re:I would but.... by moosesocks · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is interesting, because this is exactly the sort of thing that Tim Berners Lee sought to avoid when he envisioned the semantic web.

      These papers and abstracts should be properly hyperlinked to other papers (or even a google search) to properly define what many of these terms mean. A lot of the jargon seems specific to either accelerator science, or even just the LHC.

      I am a physicist who has worked on accelerator applications, and could only barely understand that abstract. It's very poorly written, and makes a far too extensive use of very specific jargon/acronyms to be comprehensible to even a physicist that happens to not be affiliated with the LHC.

      Even an undergraduate should know better than to write an abstract like that. The general incomprehensibility, the use of extremely specific and unnecessary information ("±147 m and ±220 m from IP5") would be perfectly sufficient justification for a failing grade.

      I'm truly ashamed of my colleagues for writing this.

      --
      -- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
    3. Re:I would but.... by jabernathy · · Score: 5, Informative

      "Abstract. The TOTEM Experiment will measure the total pp cross-section with the luminosity-independent method and study elastic and diffractive scattering at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collisions in the interaction point IP5, two tracking telescopes, T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity region 3.1 || 6.5, and Roman Pot stations will be placed at distances of ±147 m and ±220 m from IP5. Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS, TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue its own physics programme and at a later stage together with CMS for a common physics programme. This article gives a description of the TOTEM apparatus and its performance."

      The TOTEM experiment will measure the total pp (proton-proton) cross-section (probability of collision) with the luminosity-independent method (does not depend on the amount of incoming particles) and study elastic and diffractive scattering (particle and wave scattering) at the LHC. To achieve optimum forward (close to the beam-pipe) coverage for charged particles emitted by the pp collision in the interaction point (where the beams cross) IP5, two tracking telescopes (planes of silicon or something that can detect charge particles), (named) T1 and T2, will be installed on each side in the pseudorapidity (the angle above the beampipe) region 3.1 (~5 degrees) || 6.5 (1 degree), and Roman Pot stations (to measure the luminosity) will be placed at distances of +- 147m and +-220m from IP5 (those distances from where the particles collide). Being an independent experiment but technically integrated into CMS (the Compact Muon Spectrometer), TOTEM will first operate in standalone mode to pursue it's own physics programme...

    4. Re:I would but.... by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If Richard Feynman himself showed up and told me something crazy about theoretical physics, I'd be like, "you fool, that's crazy."

      From what I've studied, everything in theoretical physics is crazy.

      Perhaps I misunderstood you.

      I think you're conflating issues. When you're in a field, it's your job to question everything the other experts in the field claim, especially when the claims are dramatic or unexpected. When you're not in a field and want to know something about it, then it's perfectly OK to use experts analysis as a baseline for further study.

      It's not OK to dismiss all the experts in that field as crackpots just because you don't understand what they're saying. For instance, if Feynman showed up and told me that there are charm quarks, then I'd be unjustified in dismissing him. That's what ID and anti-vaccine folks do all the time: reject all authority they disagree with. Call it "appeal to anti-authority".

      --
      Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
  3. Look at this way... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...1600 pages for every detail of the making of a LHC, 6546 pages in the specs for OOXML and it's still not enough detail to let you open and create OOXML documents. Obviously the LHC is not adequately complex.

  4. I found a vulnerability... by Shag · · Score: 5, Funny

    On page 867, there's mention of a two-meter-wide thermal exhaust port, right below the main port. The exhaust shaft leads directly to the reactor system, and a precise hit would start a chain reaction which should destroy the LHC.

    --
    Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
    1. Re:I found a vulnerability... by Koiu+Lpoi · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'm afraid the LHC will be quite operational when your friends arrive.

  5. What 30 years later? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I thought that there will be no 30 years later after they turn on the machine...

    1. Re:What 30 years later? by Hal_Porter · · Score: 5, Funny

      If you end up in some evil mirror universe where W became President instread of Gore you could use the plans to build another LHC to get back home.

      --
      echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
  6. This is outrageous! by bit01 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Are they mad? The work of thousands of scientists published on line for all to see. A reasonable generic copyright license. All downloadable.

    What about the poor deserving lawyers? Where is the DRM? The commercial propaganda about "IP"? The hundred page license? The attempts by assorted hangers on to profit at other people's expense?

    I think the lawyers should form a class action lawsuit for loss of income. It's just not right that somebody should be able to do something without numerous lawyers attached.

  7. You are not the intended audience by rasmack · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I am not in TOTEM (other side of the ring) but I understand the abstract just fine and consider it an immensely valuable contribution to the physics programme of the LHC.

    These weren't written to be read end to end by the layman. They were meant as reference publications for professionals. I don't know how I would have gotten through my ph.d. without publications like these. Where else do I get the exact layout of the ATLAS semi-conductor tracker? Where else do I look for the muon momentum resolution of CMS vs. ATLAS? I am sorry if you think that renders them incomprehensible but this is what we need.

  8. Funny? by vainov · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Isn't it funny that the entire LHC spec is 1.600 pages, while the OOXML documentation, as submitted by Microsoft, is a full 6.000 pages.
    Does this reflect a difference in complexity, or is it a sign of something else?