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Revived LHC Could Run Through the Winter

Jack Spine writes "When you are powering nuclear particle beams that could drill a hole through 30 metres of copper, you don't want to be paying a premium for electricity. However, Cern scientists are determined that the delayed experiment will get some workable results, and so are preparing to run the machine throughout the winter."

17 of 164 comments (clear)

  1. LHC Could Run Through the Winter ... by SupremoMan · · Score: 5, Funny

    Or till Earth is destroyed. Whichever comes first...

    1. Re:LHC Could Run Through the Winter ... by moniker127 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Here is some bad news in that regard:
      They've spotted Gordon Freeman running around the LHC.
      http://skipsjunk.net/linked-pics/LHC_Gordon-Freeman_2.JPG

  2. Re:Odd... by linzeal · · Score: 5, Funny

    Its Europe, send packages of condoms in the mail and directions to orgies. That will keep those buggers warm.

  3. Re:I don't mean to nitpick... by 2.7182 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I definitely think that you meant to nitpick in this case. Don't deny it.

  4. Re:Odd... by timeOday · · Score: 5, Insightful
    OK, I read the article. Here is my summary:

    We are not going to shut down LHC for the winter due to high electricity costs. If it never occured to you that we would, since the apparatus and the staff would seemingly cost so much more than the electricity anyways, congratulations, it turns out you were right even when we didn't know it yet, thus we will be running the collider and everything is exactly as you would have assumed had you never read this article at all. Thanks for your time.

  5. Re:I don't mean to nitpick... by repapetilto · · Score: 5, Informative

    He didn't just try to nitpick. He actually did it. Get it straight truncated e.

  6. So what will cause the delay next time? by w0mprat · · Score: 4, Funny

    I do recall a paper suggesting that the experiment itself will interfere with itself back through time and prevent the machine from ever powering up.

    I can't find the paper on Google though, I really need to read it it'll help me figure out why the time machine I'm building doesn't work.

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    After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
  7. Re:I don't mean to nitpick... by nebaz · · Score: 5, Funny

    CEPLARN (Conseil Europeen Pour LA Recherche Nucleaire) would be a cooler name, it sounds vaguely Klingon.

    --
    Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
  8. competition with Fermilab by bcrowell · · Score: 5, Informative

    This may have to do with the fact that Fermilab could find the Higgs particle very soon, and then the LHC would have been scooped on its single most important reason for existing.

    1. Re:competition with Fermilab by Werthless5 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Unfortunately, Fermilab is unable to probe the highest possible mass ranges of the Higgs. Not without running indefinitely, that is.

      The LHC is capable of this, probably by the end of next year we'll have either fully excluded or discovered the Higgs. And a bunch of other stuff

      The biggest reason to run through winter is so that we can better understand the experiment. More run time = more interesting stuff for physicists to do! The more time we run uninterrupted, the more quickly we'll be able to fine tune the instruments.

    2. Re:competition with Fermilab by Werthless5 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This is absurd. We're talking about the cutting edge of physical discovery, and you're complaining about cost? The total cost is a few billion, and it has been spread out over 15 years.

      It might make the most startling discoveries in scientific history, but apparently that's not important!

  9. Mods: Engage humor detectors by symbolset · · Score: 5, Funny

    Unfortunately in the southern hemisphere the spin is reversed, which could result in the anti-god particle. They'll play with black holes, but there are limits to their hubris.

    The next version is the Trans-equator Hadron Collider (THC) which will circle the equator and have a branch that passes through the core in an attempt to discover stuff that's like, really cool, man. Here's a diagram.

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  10. Re:I don't mean to nitpick... by Nefarious+Wheel · · Score: 4, Funny
    I'll see your CEPLARN and raise you a FASOTRAGRABRUPAC. Nothing like Navy acronyms, they sound like Ringworld proper names.

    Hmm... so that's where he got them...

    --
    Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
  11. Re:I don't mean to nitpick... by Random+Destruction · · Score: 4

    E, CERN is ...

    Shouldn't that be 'e'?

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    :x
  12. British capitalization of acronyms by Jim+Efaw · · Score: 5, Informative

    This has been discussed previously on Slashdot. British writing often uses only initial-caps for pronounceable acronyms. The BBC is especially aggressive about this, resulting in things like "Nasa", which looks like a foreign name at first glance from an American eye. Why the BBC differentiates "BAFTA" from "NASA" in their style guide is a mystery to me; however, in recent BBC articles, it appears that the BBC is writing "Bafta" in actual practice.

    BBC House Style and Writing Guidelines, September 2007 (in PDF or raw HTML):

    "Usually, if an acronym is pronounced as a word, use an initial capital only. If it is pronounced as individual letters, use all capitals:

    • Aids Nato Acas Unicef
    • BBC CD GCSE PC
    • CD-Rom (pronounced partly as letters, partly as a word)

    But follow the preference of organisations with their own names and brands: DfES BAFTA MORI RADA

  13. Re:Odd... by deglr6328 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Translation: "Fuck! D-zero's collected like 6 inverse femtobarns of integrated luminosity and we're just sitting on our asses looking at cosmic ray hits!!! Who gives a shit about power $$$?! Switch the fucker on!!"

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    - "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
  14. I nitpick your nitpick by Attila+the+Bun · · Score: 4, Informative

    Cern should be CERN, as it stands for "Conseil Europeen pour la Recherche Nucleaire"

    Actually it doesn't. The Conseil Europeen pour la Recherche Nucleaire was a provisional body created in 1952, and no longer exists. In 1954 the European Laboratory for Particle Physics was founded, and the C.E.R.N. was dissolved. The laboratory is named CERN, and although it is conventionally capitalised, it is not an acronym.