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Large Hadron Collider

Originally posted by: Cogman
I would laugh if some worker left his wrench in the thing.

Not really related to a particle accelerator, but I hear when they were starting up the Browns Ferry 1 reactor over the last few years they had stuff like coke cans and wrenches showing up in the system at first. But obviously that was before they actually had the fuel in the system. So I would think before they startup an 8 Billion dollar piece of equipment they do some serious foreign material exclusion checks and testing before they turn it up to full speed.
 
You imagine it though? "Oh look, we have a wrench approaching the speed of light" As it shoots through the first curve and out into space 😀
 
Originally posted by: Cogman
You imagine it though? "Oh look, we have a wrench approaching the speed of light" As it shoots through the first curve and out into space 😀

That's called the Higgs particle, dude.
 
Originally posted by: BrownTown
Originally posted by: Cogman
I would laugh if some worker left his wrench in the thing.

Not really related to a particle accelerator, but I hear when they were starting up the Browns Ferry 1 reactor over the last few years they had stuff like coke cans and wrenches showing up in the system at first. But obviously that was before they actually had the fuel in the system. So I would think before they startup an 8 Billion dollar piece of equipment they do some serious foreign material exclusion checks and testing before they turn it up to full speed.

we have oysters showing up in our service water system
 
Originally posted by: JohnCU
Originally posted by: BrownTown
Originally posted by: Cogman
I would laugh if some worker left his wrench in the thing.

Not really related to a particle accelerator, but I hear when they were starting up the Browns Ferry 1 reactor over the last few years they had stuff like coke cans and wrenches showing up in the system at first. But obviously that was before they actually had the fuel in the system. So I would think before they startup an 8 Billion dollar piece of equipment they do some serious foreign material exclusion checks and testing before they turn it up to full speed.

we have oysters showing up in our service water system

yeah, but this crap was in the primary coolant loop 😛
 
THIS JUST IN: At 9:31 AM UTC the Large Hadron Collider found its first black hole. We can pin-point the time because this is the exact same time that Europe disappeared. Details at eleven.
 
If Earth doesn't have enough gravity to collapse on itself, then creating a black hole on Earth can't cause the planet to collapse. Just because you create a singularity doesn't mean it gains extra gravity.
 
Originally posted by: lpbman
If Earth doesn't have enough gravity to collapse on itself, then creating a black hole on Earth can't cause the planet to collapse. Just because you create a singularity doesn't mean it gains extra gravity.

I'm not sure, but even if it did create a stable black hole (It won't), I thought the black hole would simply fall back and forth through the center of the earth, slowly "eating" matter. I would think that it would take a LONG time before the earth was "swallowed". The event horizon would be very very small, so wouldn't it be like drilling a smaller than hair sized thread through the earth? And, given the size of the earth, it would take days before it reached the other side.

In fact, would it make it to the other side? (someone else can think this one out more completely for me) - wouldn't the gain in mass after it passed through the center result in it not quite making it back to the surface, so it would have a decreasing oscillation through the center of the earth until it finally came to rest at the center, having "eaten" perhaps a very very miniscule amount of the earth? Never mind... on second thought, then the earth would collapse in on itself as it wouldn't just remain "slightly hollow"
 
the article reads like the scientists actually are hoping for every exotic particle to be created, including black holes. Whats so funny is that it's so dangerous and if something gets out of hand there's no way of stopping it.

If they create any of these exotic particles they don't know what's going to happen and the worst part is they love it.
 
If math actually told scientists there was more than a one in a billion chance they could destroy the Earth they wouldn't do it.
 
To my knowledge there aren't any exotic particles which would pose any sort of a problem. At the energies they're dealing with, most if not all the particles that are created are very quickly decaying events. Even the "Black hole" particles are theorized to decay in much less than a second.
The other part of the black hole myth is that they suck matter into them, which isn't true, they have normal gravitational fields...something would have to impact this incredibly tiny particle directly to get absorbed. I'm not too sure on the specifics but I would imagine it has a charge as well which would give it a cross-section larger than its event horizon.
 
Warning: Pregnant women, the elderly, and children under 10 should avoid prolonged exposure to the Large Hadron Collider.

Caution: The Large Hadron Collider may suddenly accelerate to dangerous speeds.

The Large Hadron Collider contains a liquid core, which, if exposed due to rupture, should not be touched, inhaled, or looked at.

Do not use the Large Hadron Collider on concrete.

Discontinue use of the Large Hadron Collider if any of the following occurs:

* itching
* vertigo
* dizziness
* tingling in extremities
* loss of balance or coordination
* slurred speech
* temporary blindness
* profuse sweating
* or heart palpitations.

If the Large Hadron Collider begins to smoke, get away immediately. Seek shelter and cover head.

The Large Hadron Collider may stick to certain types of skin.

When not in use, the Large Hadron Collider should be returned to its special container and kept under refrigeration. Failure to do so relieves the makers of the Large Hadron Collider, the scientific community, and its parent company, the military-industrial complex, of any and all liability.

Ingredients of the Large Hadron Collider include an unknown glowing green substance which fell to Earth, presumably from outer space.

The Large Hadron Collider has been shipped to our troops in Saudi Arabia and is being dropped by our warplanes on Iraq.

Do not taunt the Large Hadron Collider.

The Large Hadron Collider comes with a lifetime warranty.
 
Even is a stable black hole where created- it would collapse onto itself, as the event horizon would be sooo small that only the particles used in the LHC would be absorbed by it- and given the time to recalibrate, and short interval of firing, this would only happen if someone tired to intentionally do it.
 
Originally posted by: Cogman
I would laugh if some worker left his wrench in the thing.

Right now they're doing a TON of materials checks. They have huge teams of people searching every nook and cranny for any trash, loose metal (ie a nail that may have been misplaced), etc.

You don't want loose metal hanging around when those superconducting magnets turn on to full power. That'll cause some serious damage, but luckily we'll know about it right away.

DrPizza, the mode you described is what happens if the black holes don't evaporate. Most theoretical models (and some experimental observation under high scrutiny) suggest that black holes tend to evaporate energy, so the low-energy black holes we create should just disappear.

If they don't, then we're essentially creating these black holes and dropping them toward the center of the earth, where they'll slowly get bigger and bigger until it's too late. Eventually this would destroy the Earth. Do you suppose that's what happened to Krypton? I like to think so.

Anyway, don't expect too much out of the LHC as far as world-altering events. A lot of models suggest that we're going to find cool particle resonances (higher energy bosons, like Z Prime, W prime, gluinos) and not much else. Finding a magnetic monopole would be great, but I don't know how it would be detectable; just one would prove that the electron's charge is the fundamental minimum charge in the universe, but how does one pick out a single magnetic monopole from all of the noise in the detector? We'll have to see a ton of them for anything remarkable to be said.
 
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