Large Hadron Collider: latest news! (2pm - 10 September, 2008)

Earlier today a major milestone was crossed, in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN: a proton beam was successfully injected and circulated in the 27-km long underground particle accelerator, for the first time. The ATLAS particle detector at the LHC registered the result of a few collisions between the beam and a collimator (click on the thumbnails for larger pictures):

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The Particle Physics group of the RHUL Physics Department has been involved in the worldwide ATLAS project since its inception, more than 15 years ago. The coming weeks will see a lot of activity at the LHC, as additional milestones are crossed: namely the simultaneous circulation of two counter-rotating beams in the collider, their acceleration to very high energy, and finally proton-proton collisions.