They are about to turn on the super-particle collider, CERN - quest for the god atom?

torchbearer

torchbearer

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7512586.stm

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This thing has been delayed for sometime... i thought it was to be launched in May, but i guess they meant, they were starting the cooling process.

Question- how do they get a spot on earth colder than deep space? how do they measure that?
Are there any risk to doing this? Is this something that happens all the time in the sun?
If we can disassemble atoms, perhaps we can learn to put them together? as in, take hyrdrogen, break it down into its 'god atoms/stem cells' and reassemble oxygen atoms?

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I don't know. The last commentary I heard on this was that it would create millions of black holes and we were all going to die :eek:
 
Cool. I'm no physicist, but the articles says the temperature is achieved with liquid helium. So, you know how cold liquid nitrogen is, I guess liquid helium is even colder?? Not sure how they measure it...I guess they have really good thermometers.

There are some concerns that the collider could produce miniature black holes or some weird elementary particles that might consume the Earth (kinda joking, but kinda not, cuz I don't think they really know if these particles actually exist or not). I think they released a report saying that the "risks are very low." I guess we'll see. Getting sucked into a black hole would be one hell of a way to go, I guess.

This stuff is fascinating. Wish I'd taken more physics so I could understand it.
 
mdmarino said:
Cool. I'm no physicist, but the articles says the temperature is achieved with liquid helium. So, you know how cold liquid nitrogen is, I guess liquid helium is even colder?? Not sure how they measure it...I guess they have really good thermometers.

There are some concerns that the collider could produce miniature black holes or some weird elementary particles that might consume the Earth (kinda joking, but kinda not, cuz I don't think they really know if these particles actually exist or not). I think they released a report saying that the "risks are very low." I guess we'll see. Getting sucked into a black hole would be one hell of a way to go, I guess.

This stuff is fascinating. Wish I'd taken more physics so I could understand it.
Click to expand...

4 Kelvin is the boiling point of liquid helium, so it has to be a little less than that (-452 F.) Absolute zero is, obviously, zero K which is the absolute suspension of all atomic motion (and believed to be impossible to achieve, though we've been tenths of a degree off.) Liquid nitrogen has a BP of 77K, so it's quite a bit different, but will cause frostbite instantaneously. Sub-zero freezers like they use in biochem labs are fun ways to blow things up. Do not try this at home.

As for how they measure the temperature, it's got to be either resistance via two-metal thermocouples or somehow they simply measure the atomic movement of the liquid helium, possibly via soundwaves? That's just a guess. It's an interesting question. Obviously they can't use your run of the mill glass/mercury thermometer, it would collapse in on itself.

As far as black holes being created--unlikely, but I can't think of a more fascinating way to go. Maybe it'll collapse us all back into a single point. I hope not though, I'm claustrophobic.
 
um could i get a "dummies" course in what the heck a super-particle collider is?

and what its useful for? or what they are trying to accomplish with it anyway?
 
amy31416 said:
As for how they measure the temperature, it's got to be either resistance via two-metal thermocouples or somehow they simply measure the atomic movement of the liquid helium, possibly via soundwaves?
Click to expand...

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761562418/Helium.html
Helium becomes a liquid at -268.9°C (-451.8°F), in a phase called helium I; below -270.98°C (-455.476°F), it changes to a phase called helium II and becomes a superfluid. Helium solidifies at -272.2°C (-457.9°F) at pressures above 26 atmospheres; helium boils at -268.9°C (-452.0°F) and has a density of 0.1664 g/liter at 20°C (68°F) and one atmosphere.
Click to expand...

So if we convert -268.9°C (helium I) to Kelvin we get 4.25°K. Almost absolute zero.
If we convert -270.98°C (helium II) to Kelvin we get 2.17°K. Very close to absolute zero.
If we convert -272.2°C (frozen helium) to Kelvin we get 0.95°K. So close to absolute zero it is unbelievable.

The question is, are they using helium for a refrigerant? If so, they can get very close to absolute zero if they let it solidify through using evaporative cooling of helium to obtain solid helium crystals. This is the same process used to make dry ice from carbon dioxide.

I would guess they would measure the temperature of it through the use of resistance devices. They have a very good range of devices that go super conductive at around those temperatures.
 
roxic27 said:
um could i get a "dummies" course in what the heck a super-particle collider is?

and what its useful for? or what they are trying to accomplish with it anyway?
Click to expand...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider

They're trying to use that to find this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higgs_boson

We don't know what sort of things we'll find out from it, but, the Higgs-Boson particle is referred to as the "God" particle because it will allegedly explain how things that are "massless" come together to construct something with mass. It's critical to figuring out how it works with macroscopic things. Beyond that, I got a book on it and holy sweet jesus is that some complicated calculatin.'


It's also what I want for Christmas.
 
Dr.3D said:
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761562418/Helium.html


So if we convert -268.9°C (helium I) to Kelvin we get 4.25°K. Almost absolute zero.
If we convert -270.98°C (helium II) to Kelvin we get 2.17°K. Very close to absolute zero.
If we convert -272.2°C (frozen helium) to Kelvin we get 0.95°K. So close to absolute zero it is unbelievable.

The question is, are they using helium for a refrigerant? If so, they can get very close to absolute zero if they let it solidify through using evaporative cooling of helium to obtain solid helium crystals. This is the same process used to make dry ice from carbon dioxide.

I would guess they would measure the temperature of it through the use of resistance devices. They have a very good range of devices that go super conductive at around those temperatures.
Click to expand...

Pretty amazing stuff, no? They got to 500 picoKelvin in 2003. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/301/5639/1513

They use helium as a refrigerant in NMR's and I'm assuming that it's a lot like that but on a very large scale, though I'm not exactly sure of the process they'll use. I can't imagine it'd be too much different. I'm sure they would have to have some pretty specialized thermocouples/resistance devices (about the same thing in my mind) to measure it.
 
Dr.3D said:
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761562418/Helium.html


So if we convert -268.9°C (helium I) to Kelvin we get 4.25°K. Almost absolute zero.
If we convert -270.98°C (helium II) to Kelvin we get 2.17°K. Very close to absolute zero.
If we convert -272.2°C (frozen helium) to Kelvin we get 0.95°K. So close to absolute zero it is unbelievable.

The question is, are they using helium for a refrigerant? If so, they can get very close to absolute zero if they let it solidify through using evaporative cooling of helium to obtain solid helium crystals. This is the same process used to make dry ice from carbon dioxide.

I would guess they would measure the temperature of it through the use of resistance devices. They have a very good range of devices that go super conductive at around those temperatures.
Click to expand...

Do they cool everything down that far so that the only thing moving is the photons?
 
roxic27 said:
um could i get a "dummies" course in what the heck a super-particle collider is?

and what its useful for? or what they are trying to accomplish with it anyway?
Click to expand...

A Particle Collider is a device made up of a tunnel, miles in circumference that accelerate atomic particles to near the speed of light. After this is achieved many different things can happen. The particles could hit a Penning Trap at the end and be forced to separate into their anti-particles, making anti-matter ie: Anti-Protons, Neutrinos, and Positrons. Antimatter is the most sensitive material is the known universe and the most potent energy force in the known universe. A gram of antimatter can fuel a rocket ship to Mars and back in 6 weeks. The energy is released when the antimatter makes contact with regular matter and they both annihilate turning into pure energy leaving no traces behind. It could also produce mini-black holes which are actually harmless because they are the size of a electron and can either 1). Vanish into thin air as soon as they are formed because they are instable, or 2). Zip through the Earth at the speed of light taking an estimated 1 X 10^-6 grams of Earth with them which is smaller than a grain of rice. They could also find God Particles,or Higgs Boson, which is the elementary particle that is believed to bestow mass on matter.

Chances of a catastrophic event are really really really really really small. Almost non-existent. Perhaps as small as an electron? :p
 
idiom said:
Also Deep Space is pretty warm. Oddly enough.
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would it be safe to assume, where warmth is present, mass is too... and the more mass per square unit the more heat generated?
So in space... these stray forms of matter are everywhere... like cosmic dust.
And galaxies are the places where this dust has slowly(relative to a human life) congealed around.
 
torchbearer said:
would it be safe to assume, where warmth is present, mass is too... and the more mass per square unit the more heat generated?
Click to expand...

If there's warmth, there's mass, as heat is simply the transfer of energy between two objects due to differences in temperature. When energy does work, it produces heat. If you really mean energy, rather than heat, then there is more potential energy to do work and thus a denser mass could produce more heat in the right circumstances.

Mass and energy are interchangeable, so yeah, you could get more heat from more mass. Not really sure that that answers your question though. :)
 
amy31416 said:
If there's warmth, there's mass, as heat is simply the transfer of energy between two objects due to differences in temperature. When energy does work, it produces heat. If you really mean energy, rather than heat, then there is more potential energy to do work and thus a denser mass could produce more heat in the right circumstances.

Mass and energy are interchangeable, so yeah, you could get more heat from more mass. Not really sure that that answers your question though. :)
Click to expand...

Like the question, at what size in mass does a Jupiter become a star?
One assumption is... if a Jupiter gains enough mass, the inward force of gravity at the center of the planet itself will become a nuclear reactor and ignite.

The more mass the more potential energy due to the effects of gravity and its link to density of mass.
 
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