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Proton Beams Sent Around the LHC

Posted by kdawson on from the going-in-circles dept.

feldhaus writes "The BBC reports that the first beams for over one year have been successfully sent around the complete circumference of the Large Hadron Collider. Engineers do not yet have a stable circulating beam but they hope to by 0600 GMT on Saturday."

1 of 115 comments (clear)

  1. Re:why protons and not neutrons? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    My understanding is that neutrons, like any other subatomic particle, do not rest unless at 0 Kelvin. Otherwise, they will wiggle about, making poor targets in the absence of an sort of capture/containment field. Also, cooling to 0K is asymptotically hard to achieve, effectively impossible.

    At present, it looks like the LHC will operate at just above 0K, but not at it.
    http://lhc.web.cern.ch/lhc/

    Charged particles, on the other hand, may be held at a known location and/or known path with the application of a containment field.