Its The End Of The World As We Know It ... And I Feel Fine

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a 27 kilometer (17 mile) long particle accelerator straddling the border of Switzerland and France, is nearly set to begin its first particle beam tests. The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) is preparing for its first small tests in early August, leading to a planned full-track test in September - and the first planned particle collisions before the end of the year. The final step before starting is the chilling of the entire collider to -271.25 C (-456.25 F). Here is a collection of photographs from CERN, showing various stages of completion of the LHC and several of its larger experiments (some over seven stories tall), over the past several years.

Im surprised Miguel has been so quiet round here, and didn't want to pitch in his 2 cents for this one :) in fact, no one even picked up on the REM song reference. come on people, what more important things are happening than tuning in here ... ahh I kid, I kid.

Updated September 15, 2008 - It was last week on Wednesday, September 10, 2008, near Geneva, Switzerland, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) fired only a single beam of protons around the 17-mile-long underground circular tunnel - not two beams of protons hitting head-to-head near the speed of light.

Two reasons: First, LHC wanted to test hardware and magnets first. Second, shortly after the firing, computer hackers broke into the computers connected to the Compact Muon Solenoid Detector (CMSD) and left this message: “We're pulling your pants down because we don't want to see you running around naked looking to hide yourselves when the panic comes.”

Physicist Joseph Lykken heads the CMSD science team and told me today that the hackers themselves closed the “hacked doorway” through which they entered. Further, none of the computers controlling the actual LHC proton beam collisions have any connections to the outside world for precisely the reason to prevent hackers from interfering with such a powerful laboratory as the LHC.

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they must have blown they're budget on the LHC, they couldnt even give this poor worker a proper desk and an LCD screen. Come on fella's! :)