The CERN particle accelerator that can breathe new life into physics

A brand new breed of collider, known as plasma wakefield accelerators, can research elementary physics in new methods by doing one thing the Massive Hadron Collider can not do: colliding electrons

By Joshua Howgego

TO GET to Edda Gschwendtner’s experiment, you enter a small, brutalist constructing at CERN, Europe’s particle physics laboratory on the outskirts of Geneva, Switzerland. You head into the elevate and descend 50 metres into an unlimited underground chamber. After a collection of yellow safety doorways, you have to traverse a kilometre alongside a downward-sloping tunnel – which is why Gschwendtner sometimes makes use of one of many small white bikes parked contained in the doorways.

She is creating a promising form of particle accelerator which may assist us discover new physics. For the reason that discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012, particle physics hasn’t made a lot progress to talk of. So, ideas are turning to machines that may assist us probe actuality in numerous methods.

The experiment Gschwendtner works on, known as AWAKE, creates a wave of plasma – a gasoline of charged particles – and sends electrons browsing alongside it. Whereas most colliders are getting greater and pricier, this underground machine and its ilk, often known as plasma wakefield accelerators, are compact. Don’t be fooled by their measurement, although – they pack a punch. In contrast with the likes of CERN’s huge Massive Hadron Collider (LHC), over a set distance, plasma wakefield know-how can handle a lot stronger accelerations. “Up to a factor of 1000 more,” says Gschwendtner.

It’s proving efficient. Over the previous few years, AWAKE has had a string of successes in accelerating electrons over a distance of simply metres. Final yr, it handed a vital take a look at, and researchers are actually gearing as much as take it to increased energies. …