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Hello, and welcome to the Physics World Weekly
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podcast. I'm Hamish Johnston.
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The European Organization
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for Nuclear Research
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or CERN
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was founded in Geneva in 1954.
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Today, it's most famous for the Large Hadron
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Collider,
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which accelerates
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protons and nuclei
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in opposite directions
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around a 27
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kilometer ring before smashing them together
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at high energies.
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In 2012,
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'2 experiments on the LHC
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announced the discovery of the long sought after
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Higgs boson.
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And that's just one of the many important
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breakthroughs
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made at the lab.
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But CERN isn't just about colliding particles.
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It's a leader in the study of antimatter,
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the place where the world wide web was
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invented.
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And CERN was home to John Bell,
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whose famous theorem
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marked a profound
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step forward in our understanding
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of quantum physics.
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In this podcast, I'm joined by my physics
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world colleague, Margaret Harris, who is back from
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a visit to CERN with an update on
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the exciting
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physics that's being done there.
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Hi, Margaret.
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Welcome to the podcast.
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Hi, Amish.
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Now if there's one lab that every physicist
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should visit once in their lifetime, it's got
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to be CERN,
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the the sort of preeminent,
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particle physics lab in Europe and and maybe
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in the world.
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What was it like? How would you describe,
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your trip? What's it like being at CERN?
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Certainly, at the moment, it is the world's
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premier high energy physics laboratory.
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And I was told by one of my
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tour guides,
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Sarah Aldewelt, who's an early career researcher at
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the University of Edinburgh when she's not working
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at the ATLAS detector at CERN. She said
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that this is an interesting time to visit
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CERN, and I hope to have her on
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the podcast at some point to explain this
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in more detail.
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But, essentially, if you're a particle physicist, you
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have several possible modes of operation.
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You can be in data taking mode. You
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can be in data analysis mode, so dealing
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with the data you've already got, and you
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can be in the upgrading the experiment mode,
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or you can be thinking about future upgrades.
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And future in that in this case could
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mean five years from now or could mean,
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in extreme cases, you know, up to fifty
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years away.
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And right now, CERN is operating in all
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but one of those modes. There wasn't any
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data collection when I was going on because
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the collider shut down over the winter.
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This is to save on electricity costs,
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and also to help avoid putting too much
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demand on the French or Swiss
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electrical grids at a time when demand for
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heating is already high.
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The it's funny. The the LHC actually requires
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as much electricity as the entire city of
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Geneva when it's running. This is the Large
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Hadron Collider, the main collider at CERN. Wow.
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So so there's no new science data being
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generated during the winter,
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but absolutely everything else is happening right now.
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In a couple months months, there'll be spring.
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The LHC will restart.
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But then in 2026, it will enter a
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longer shutdown, one that will last all the
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way until 2030,
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during which it will get what will probably
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end up being its last major upgrade.
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So unlike a previous upgrade where they went
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from colliding protons at energies of five oh,
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so sorry. Seven teraelectron
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volts
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TeV
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to clotting them at 14 TeV,
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this upgrade isn't an energy increase.
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Instead, it's an increase in luminosity.
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Now what's that mean? Well, the the beep
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beams of the LHC are made up of
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bunches of protons,
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and every bunch contains about a hundred billion
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protons.
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But because protons are so small, the vast
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majority of them don't collide when you cross
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the beams.
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You might get a few tens of collisions
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per crossing.
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Now that might sound really low, but because
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those crossings happen 40,000,000 times per second, you
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do still get a lot of data.
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In fact, you get so much data that
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CERN pioneered the handling of big data, and
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they have really complex algorithms to help them
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decide which data points to keep for future
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analysis
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and which to throw away because they're not
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gonna be very interesting.
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But the high luminosity
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upgrade is going to bring that up to
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200 collisions per crossing. So now you're talking
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about an order of magnitude more data that
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could be generated per unit time.
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And and this high luminosity upgrade, I mean,
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it's not just simply a matter of pumping
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more,
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protons into the accelerator. I mean, I'll I
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mean, just about am I right in thinking
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that just about every aspect
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of the LHC and and the experiments that
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are on it have to be
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modified
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or tweaked in some way
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just to to to achieve this?
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Certainly, the the two main,
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biggest experiments,
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ATLAS and CMS, have have to undergo major
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tweaks for this.
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So but I think there's actually 17 different
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work packages involved, and I saw only two
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of them. So I can tell you about
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those two. I don't know about the the
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totality of the upgrades going on.
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But the first upgrade that I saw on
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my tour involved something called a crab cavity.
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And what these cavities do is that they
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tilt the proton bunches
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so the protons in them appear to be
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moving sideways like a crab walks.
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Oh, that's why it's called a crab cavity.
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Yeah. That's why it's called a crab cavity.
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I always wondered about that. Well, listeners, you
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learn something new every day.
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They don't look anything like a crab.
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But the reason they they want to make
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the move sideways is because at the moment,
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the beams of the LHC cross
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I mean, it's not at right angles exactly.
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It's more like a sort of flattened x
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shape,
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but the area overlap isn't huge.
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But once the crab cavity is installed, they'll
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get a much fuller overlap. So if you
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can imagine this difference between placing your two
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fists in a cross at the wrists and
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aligning your hands so that your entire arms
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are sort of all crossing in front of
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you.
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And that means every proton in a bunch
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is gonna have to pass through the whole
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length of the bunch moving in the opposite
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direction.
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And that on its own will increase the
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number of collisions per crossing
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by around 20%.
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Now of course if you're getting more collisions
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you're also gonna need a detector and readout
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electronics that can handle that. And that's where
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the other work package I saw, the inner
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tracker or ITK
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systems upgrade
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comes in. And this is gonna become the
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new heart of the ATLAS detector. I guess
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you could say the detector is having a
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heart transplant effectively.
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And right now, this inner tracker doesn't look
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like much. It looks like an empty tube.
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It's about as tall as I am with
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slots in it, and these slots are gonna
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be filled by long
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strip like silicon based sensors.
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I see. And I have to say, Margaret,
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I'm very, very jealous that you got to
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see,
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ATLAS. I mean, I I I suppose that's
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one of the bonuses of visiting CERN when
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the,
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collider isn't running, that you could actually
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go down and see the experiment.
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So what what what was that like? Was
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it I mean, you you hear stories of
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it being huge.
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How huge is it? Can you can you
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can you give us, I don't know. Is
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is is it small office building huge or,
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what's the story? Yeah. It's I don't know
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the exact numbers. It's several stories tall. It's
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a hundred meters underground.
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To get in there, you have to go
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through a security system that's sort of like
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walking into a if you can imagine that,
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an old fashioned telephone booth with a door
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on the front and a door in the
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back. So you walk into the the front
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of the telephone booth. You stand on a
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a square
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that is apparently like testing your weight as
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well as sort of scanning you like an
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airport scanner.
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And
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then the doors open, you get to go
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out. And if you're carrying anything and you
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want to carry some tools or a backpack
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or anything like that, it has to go
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through a separate slot.
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And they they were a little bit cagey
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about exactly what this is doing, but it's
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essentially making sure
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that everybody is counted in and counted back
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out and that the same people go in
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as come out and they're not they're not
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carrying
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undue amounts of extra stuff with them while
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either on the way in
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or on the way out.
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So you can, you know, appreciate the sort
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of security. It's it's both for security and
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also for safety. You don't want there to
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be an incident. You forget that there's one
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of your people is still down a hundred
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meters underground. Yeah. So so it's got there's
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a lot a lot of preamble or build
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up to it. And then you get down
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to the detector itself, and it's absolutely enormous.
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And I think
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the thing that that most impressed me about
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it, this enormous machine, it's probably one of
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the biggest machines
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that humankind has ever constructed.
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The thing that most impressed me about it
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was the cable ties. And that's not because
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cable ties were impressive or because they were
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really fancy or whatever. It's because each of
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those cable ties, and I could probably see
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hundreds from just where I was standing, each
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of them was put in place by a
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human being who knew exactly what he or
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she was was doing,
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and they had to be put together in
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this whole giant machine was fabricated entirely by
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hand, by human hands and human brains who
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knew exactly what they were doing. And that's
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just, I think that's that's the thing that
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got me about the detector, not its sheer
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size or the fact that there's, you know,
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above you, there's a hole in the ceiling
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that lets new new components be lowered down.
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It was seeing those cable ties and just
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realizing
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the immense amount of effort that went into
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to making this this machine.
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And I I I suppose the information that
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flows through a lot of those cables is,
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you know, just a tiny bit of the
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information that the the detector produces, and then
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that that's all put together
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Yeah. You know, to tell you, you you
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know, to tell physicists about,
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the details of a of a collision. Yeah.
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It is it is just amazing, really. I
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mean, I've never seen ATLAS. I have seen
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CMS, which I don't I don't think is
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quite as big, but it was,
285
00:10:03,415 --> 00:10:06,295
it was definitely impressive. So so was ATLAS
286
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was it more or less intact when you
287
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saw it, or had they was it taken
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apart? Was it in pieces on the floor
289
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or sort of halfway in between?
290
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I mean, it looked pretty intact to me.
291
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There wasn't a big, gigantic chunk missing, which
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is absolutely what will happen when they put
293
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this, this new ITK,
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inner tracker in.
295
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And one of the advantages of this new
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design that goes in is that it should
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be more
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radiation hard than the inner detector that's in
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Atlas now.
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The scientists have showed me around the Integration
301
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Hall where this, inner tracker is being assembled
302
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before it gets lowered through that that
303
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hole in the roof down a hundred meters
304
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underground.
305
00:10:46,620 --> 00:10:48,860
They said that the existing detector would actually
306
00:10:48,860 --> 00:10:51,100
need replacing anyway even if they weren't doing
307
00:10:51,100 --> 00:10:52,879
this high luminosity upgrade
308
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because it's absorbed so much radiation over the,
309
00:10:55,914 --> 00:10:57,754
you know, decade or more that it's been
310
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in ATLAS.
311
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It's absorbed so much radiation from the all
312
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the particle collisions and all the the debris
313
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of those collisions that it's becoming harder to
314
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supply enough voltage to deplete the silicon in
315
00:11:10,220 --> 00:11:13,179
the detector itself. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah. So,
316
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you know, this is is you don't think
317
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I personally don't think of the LHC as
318
00:11:17,419 --> 00:11:19,340
being that older device, but it's actually you
319
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know, it's been going for quite a while,
320
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and there's there are thing there are things
321
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there there's,
322
00:11:24,965 --> 00:11:26,884
you know, a lot of of science has
323
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been done about the auxiliary systems that go
324
00:11:28,884 --> 00:11:30,565
into it. You know, think of where silicon
325
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semiconductor
326
00:11:31,445 --> 00:11:34,165
electronics was in, I don't know, the early
327
00:11:34,165 --> 00:11:36,165
two thousands when they were designing and building
328
00:11:36,165 --> 00:11:37,764
this thing, and think about where it is
329
00:11:37,764 --> 00:11:39,205
now. You know, there's a real reason for
330
00:11:39,205 --> 00:11:41,419
upgrades that have, you know, all everything to
331
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do with lots of different areas of of
332
00:11:43,179 --> 00:11:43,679
science,
333
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not just particle physics.
334
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So the new system can deal with a
335
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higher number of collisions,
336
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as well as being able to to cope
337
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with, the the radiation.
338
00:11:53,795 --> 00:11:56,595
It's just far more granular, faster channels, faster
339
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electronics.
340
00:11:57,875 --> 00:12:00,434
Right. And the the the other thing I
341
00:12:00,434 --> 00:12:01,495
I remember is
342
00:12:02,675 --> 00:12:04,375
when you go to see these detectors,
343
00:12:04,915 --> 00:12:07,394
you you actually have to leave the main
344
00:12:07,394 --> 00:12:08,535
site of,
345
00:12:09,690 --> 00:12:11,690
of CERN, don't you? At least with CMS.
346
00:12:11,690 --> 00:12:13,290
So is did you have to get on
347
00:12:13,290 --> 00:12:14,889
a bus and sort of go across the
348
00:12:14,889 --> 00:12:16,570
border into France? And,
349
00:12:17,129 --> 00:12:19,070
you know, did they tell you to
350
00:12:19,610 --> 00:12:21,870
remember your passport just in case?
351
00:12:23,084 --> 00:12:24,924
They didn't mention the passport. My phone was
352
00:12:24,924 --> 00:12:26,445
going off all the time saying, welcome to
353
00:12:26,445 --> 00:12:28,764
France. Welcome to Switzerland. You have this much
354
00:12:28,764 --> 00:12:30,924
data on your your plan. So I guess
355
00:12:30,924 --> 00:12:33,404
that that was actually the only indication I
356
00:12:33,404 --> 00:12:34,924
had that we were crossing the border at
357
00:12:34,924 --> 00:12:37,200
the particular places I went because it is,
358
00:12:37,360 --> 00:12:39,540
you know, relatively open border. There are checkpoints,
359
00:12:39,600 --> 00:12:40,580
but, you know, there's
360
00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:43,120
it's part of Central Europe. There's a lot
361
00:12:43,120 --> 00:12:44,799
of of freedom to cross the border, which
362
00:12:44,799 --> 00:12:47,040
is good for the scientists to work there
363
00:12:47,040 --> 00:12:48,320
because a lot of them live in France
364
00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:50,340
and then work in Switzerland or vice versa.
365
00:12:51,785 --> 00:12:53,625
But yeah. No. It it's I think one
366
00:12:53,625 --> 00:12:55,465
people we I spoke to said that he
367
00:12:55,465 --> 00:12:57,545
he compares it. He's from from Glasgow originally.
368
00:12:57,545 --> 00:12:59,625
He compares it to Glasgow subway system in
369
00:12:59,625 --> 00:13:01,705
terms of the the length of it. Oh,
370
00:13:01,705 --> 00:13:03,705
that's famously a big loop, isn't it? The
371
00:13:03,705 --> 00:13:07,019
Glasgow subway system. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because I
372
00:13:07,019 --> 00:13:08,699
I, you know, I I've been discerned twice,
373
00:13:08,699 --> 00:13:09,980
and I think the first time was in
374
00:13:09,980 --> 00:13:12,459
the nineties. And back then, you know, whatever
375
00:13:12,459 --> 00:13:14,399
the arrangement was between France
376
00:13:14,940 --> 00:13:15,839
and Switzerland,
377
00:13:16,220 --> 00:13:18,240
there was actually a border
378
00:13:18,955 --> 00:13:20,875
to cross, you know, there there was a
379
00:13:20,875 --> 00:13:22,575
kiosk there with somebody,
380
00:13:22,955 --> 00:13:25,054
you know, we I had to flash my
381
00:13:25,195 --> 00:13:27,195
passport, and we drove through. But then the
382
00:13:27,195 --> 00:13:29,434
second time, yeah, as you say, the the
383
00:13:29,434 --> 00:13:31,534
border had magically disappeared
384
00:13:32,500 --> 00:13:34,279
as it has in, yeah,
385
00:13:34,899 --> 00:13:35,559
in a lot
386
00:13:36,100 --> 00:13:36,679
of Europe.
387
00:13:37,299 --> 00:13:39,059
It's certainly a softer border than it than
388
00:13:39,059 --> 00:13:41,079
it has been sometimes in the past. Yeah.
389
00:13:41,379 --> 00:13:42,579
So so Margaret, the
390
00:13:43,379 --> 00:13:45,459
we've got this where we will have this
391
00:13:45,459 --> 00:13:46,200
high luminosity
392
00:13:47,245 --> 00:13:50,365
LHC running at some point in the future.
393
00:13:50,365 --> 00:13:52,444
What what does that mean for the the
394
00:13:52,444 --> 00:13:52,944
physics
395
00:13:53,245 --> 00:13:55,985
that's being done at experiments like ATLAS?
396
00:13:56,684 --> 00:13:58,845
Why is it important to to see more
397
00:13:58,845 --> 00:13:59,345
collisions?
398
00:14:00,600 --> 00:14:02,220
Well, it will allow the
399
00:14:02,679 --> 00:14:03,419
the the two,
400
00:14:03,879 --> 00:14:06,759
high energy physics experiments at the LHC, ATLAS
401
00:14:06,759 --> 00:14:09,480
and CMS, to collect 10 times more data
402
00:14:09,480 --> 00:14:10,700
than they have now,
403
00:14:11,240 --> 00:14:13,399
and to explore the energy frontier with more
404
00:14:13,399 --> 00:14:14,539
potential for discovery.
405
00:14:15,024 --> 00:14:16,384
And this is kind of amazing to me.
406
00:14:16,384 --> 00:14:17,985
You know, the LHC has been running off
407
00:14:17,985 --> 00:14:19,845
and on since 02/2008,
408
00:14:20,225 --> 00:14:22,304
but it's actually only collected 10% of the
409
00:14:22,304 --> 00:14:24,544
data it's ever going to collect. It will
410
00:14:24,544 --> 00:14:26,084
get the remaining 90%
411
00:14:26,384 --> 00:14:28,384
during this high Lumi run, which is scheduled
412
00:14:28,384 --> 00:14:29,764
last from 2030
413
00:14:30,059 --> 00:14:32,320
through to about 2040 or thereabouts.
414
00:14:33,019 --> 00:14:33,519
And
415
00:14:33,899 --> 00:14:36,460
a key focus for the high luminosity LHC
416
00:14:36,460 --> 00:14:38,539
will be studying something something called a dye
417
00:14:38,539 --> 00:14:40,860
Higgs event, which is not where the Higgs
418
00:14:40,860 --> 00:14:41,835
boson dies.
419
00:14:42,394 --> 00:14:44,654
It's where you create not one Higgs boson,
420
00:14:44,715 --> 00:14:46,175
but two of them at once.
421
00:14:46,715 --> 00:14:48,795
And once you have two Higgs boson at
422
00:14:48,795 --> 00:14:51,035
once, that means you can study what happens
423
00:14:51,035 --> 00:14:52,975
when the Higgs interacts with itself.
424
00:14:53,995 --> 00:14:57,029
Fabiola Giannati, who's the current CERN director general,
425
00:14:57,029 --> 00:14:58,250
called this self interaction
426
00:14:58,870 --> 00:15:01,509
a portal to exploring interactions in the early
427
00:15:01,509 --> 00:15:02,009
universe.
428
00:15:02,710 --> 00:15:05,190
So within about a picosecond or ten to
429
00:15:05,190 --> 00:15:07,129
the minus twelve seconds of the big bang,
430
00:15:07,350 --> 00:15:09,429
this is when the Higgs field first became
431
00:15:09,429 --> 00:15:09,929
established.
432
00:15:10,514 --> 00:15:12,355
And so understanding how that came about is
433
00:15:12,355 --> 00:15:15,975
crucial to understanding how initially massless elementary particles
434
00:15:16,595 --> 00:15:18,595
end up gaining mass by interacting with this
435
00:15:18,595 --> 00:15:21,095
Higgs field and turning into the massive quarks
436
00:15:21,154 --> 00:15:23,174
and electrons we see around us today,
437
00:15:23,570 --> 00:15:25,169
which are what you need to be have
438
00:15:25,169 --> 00:15:26,709
in order to form atoms.
439
00:15:27,490 --> 00:15:29,889
And this Higgs pair production also has some
440
00:15:29,889 --> 00:15:30,389
implications
441
00:15:31,089 --> 00:15:34,209
for matter, antimatter asymmetry. So we might learn
442
00:15:34,209 --> 00:15:35,110
about that too.
443
00:15:35,735 --> 00:15:37,995
I see. And, I mean,
444
00:15:39,014 --> 00:15:41,575
the LHC and, you know, that sort of
445
00:15:41,575 --> 00:15:44,375
high energy particle physics is not the only
446
00:15:44,375 --> 00:15:44,875
science
447
00:15:45,335 --> 00:15:47,815
that's done at CERN. And, you know, to
448
00:15:47,815 --> 00:15:49,675
me, I think one of the most interesting,
449
00:15:50,769 --> 00:15:51,269
group,
450
00:15:51,649 --> 00:15:53,250
of experiments that,
451
00:15:53,649 --> 00:15:55,730
are being done there at the moment are
452
00:15:55,730 --> 00:15:56,470
the antimatter
453
00:15:57,009 --> 00:15:59,649
experiments. And I think you you also paid
454
00:15:59,649 --> 00:16:01,750
a visit to the was it the antimatter
455
00:16:01,889 --> 00:16:04,445
factory? Do I have that right? At Yeah.
456
00:16:04,605 --> 00:16:07,024
At CERN. Yeah. The antimatter factory.
457
00:16:07,804 --> 00:16:08,945
There's actually I think
458
00:16:09,325 --> 00:16:10,384
it's a little bit,
459
00:16:11,485 --> 00:16:13,644
question of what the boundary between different experiments
460
00:16:13,644 --> 00:16:15,644
lies, but I think there's actually five experiments
461
00:16:15,644 --> 00:16:16,945
at the antimatter factory.
462
00:16:17,389 --> 00:16:20,110
And all of them are in various ways
463
00:16:20,110 --> 00:16:22,289
and with different techniques looking for differences,
464
00:16:22,750 --> 00:16:25,389
actually, between the matter and look exploring this
465
00:16:25,389 --> 00:16:27,250
matter antimatter asymmetry asymmetry
466
00:16:27,629 --> 00:16:29,389
in a different way. They're looking for differences
467
00:16:29,389 --> 00:16:31,894
between the behavior of matter and the behavior
468
00:16:31,954 --> 00:16:32,454
antimatter,
469
00:16:33,074 --> 00:16:35,554
whether that's the behavior antimatter under gravity as
470
00:16:35,554 --> 00:16:38,534
with the alpha g, g bar, and AEGIS
471
00:16:38,914 --> 00:16:42,274
experiments, or different magnetic moments as with the
472
00:16:42,274 --> 00:16:45,574
base experiments or spectra as with, the
473
00:16:45,970 --> 00:16:47,110
Asakusa experiments.
474
00:16:47,649 --> 00:16:49,409
I see. And and and the reason this
475
00:16:49,409 --> 00:16:50,230
is important,
476
00:16:50,929 --> 00:16:52,850
is that what we know that at least
477
00:16:52,850 --> 00:16:54,149
in the visible universe,
478
00:16:54,690 --> 00:16:57,830
there's much more matter than antimatter.
479
00:16:58,325 --> 00:17:00,325
And if we could we we could sort
480
00:17:00,325 --> 00:17:03,225
of work out why by looking for differences
481
00:17:03,445 --> 00:17:06,085
between the two, that could that could tell
482
00:17:06,085 --> 00:17:06,984
us a lot
483
00:17:07,285 --> 00:17:09,545
about, well, what we don't know
484
00:17:09,924 --> 00:17:10,825
about physics.
485
00:17:11,880 --> 00:17:13,799
So so what, I mean I mean, I
486
00:17:13,799 --> 00:17:15,880
think, you know, the most famous experiment that
487
00:17:15,880 --> 00:17:18,359
was that's been done there is, you know,
488
00:17:18,359 --> 00:17:19,500
testing this idea
489
00:17:19,880 --> 00:17:20,859
that does antimatter
490
00:17:21,160 --> 00:17:22,059
fall up,
491
00:17:22,840 --> 00:17:24,539
or, you know, does it somehow
492
00:17:25,080 --> 00:17:26,460
respond to gravity
493
00:17:26,944 --> 00:17:28,704
in a different way? And I think this
494
00:17:28,785 --> 00:17:31,825
so far, the answer is no. But there's
495
00:17:31,825 --> 00:17:35,265
lots of really interesting experiments there, aren't there?
496
00:17:35,265 --> 00:17:36,164
Doing spectroscopy
497
00:17:36,785 --> 00:17:39,184
on anti atoms and
498
00:17:39,505 --> 00:17:41,585
I mean, it's some amazing stuff they do
499
00:17:41,585 --> 00:17:44,450
there when you consider that antimatter doesn't really
500
00:17:44,450 --> 00:17:46,390
want to hang around for too long.
501
00:17:47,089 --> 00:17:47,589
No.
502
00:17:47,890 --> 00:17:50,130
And I think this area of CERN actually
503
00:17:50,289 --> 00:17:52,210
you know, I'm talking about the Hi Lumi
504
00:17:52,210 --> 00:17:54,450
upgrade for ATLAS and CMS, but this area
505
00:17:54,450 --> 00:17:56,690
of CERN actually had its big upgrade relatively
506
00:17:56,690 --> 00:17:57,190
recently.
507
00:17:58,744 --> 00:18:00,365
As recently as 2018,
508
00:18:00,424 --> 00:18:03,384
each of those animator experiments got eight hours
509
00:18:03,384 --> 00:18:05,704
of beam time per day, which is, you
510
00:18:05,704 --> 00:18:07,224
know, a decent working day, but, you know,
511
00:18:07,224 --> 00:18:08,505
you've got a machine. You could run it
512
00:18:08,505 --> 00:18:10,284
twenty four seven if you wanted to.
513
00:18:11,910 --> 00:18:14,070
But due to an upgrade of the Elena
514
00:18:14,070 --> 00:18:14,570
ring
515
00:18:14,950 --> 00:18:16,410
that provides actually slower
516
00:18:16,950 --> 00:18:19,450
particles, everywhere else at CERN wants fast particles,
517
00:18:19,750 --> 00:18:21,769
the antimatter factory wants slower particles.
518
00:18:23,190 --> 00:18:26,355
This Elena ring upgrade provides half a million
519
00:18:26,355 --> 00:18:28,455
anti protons per two minute shot,
520
00:18:28,914 --> 00:18:31,494
and that became fully operational in 2021.
521
00:18:31,555 --> 00:18:33,714
And now it delivers anti protons to four
522
00:18:33,714 --> 00:18:36,275
experiments at once twenty four seven while it's
523
00:18:36,275 --> 00:18:36,775
running.
524
00:18:37,234 --> 00:18:38,835
And what that means is that alpha, which
525
00:18:38,835 --> 00:18:40,275
is what I heard about most because my
526
00:18:40,275 --> 00:18:42,579
tour guide, April Cridland, is a research fellow
527
00:18:42,579 --> 00:18:44,440
at CERN who's part of the alpha collaboration.
528
00:18:45,940 --> 00:18:47,380
What that means is whereas they used to
529
00:18:47,380 --> 00:18:50,259
take make maybe 20 or 30 atoms of
530
00:18:50,259 --> 00:18:52,200
anti hydrogen every four minutes,
531
00:18:52,579 --> 00:18:54,339
now they're making more than a hundred, which
532
00:18:54,339 --> 00:18:56,025
is a huge step because what used to
533
00:18:56,025 --> 00:18:56,525
take
534
00:18:57,065 --> 00:18:58,365
weeks now takes a day.
535
00:18:58,744 --> 00:19:00,744
So so she was saying that, actually, there's
536
00:19:00,744 --> 00:19:02,984
lots of alpha results due out later this
537
00:19:02,984 --> 00:19:03,725
year, including,
538
00:19:04,664 --> 00:19:05,164
sympathetically
539
00:19:05,545 --> 00:19:08,924
cooling antimatter with beryllium. So putting antimatter into
540
00:19:08,984 --> 00:19:10,205
contact with beryllium
541
00:19:10,950 --> 00:19:11,450
to
542
00:19:12,069 --> 00:19:14,569
maximize the number of anti hydrogen atoms trapped.
543
00:19:15,029 --> 00:19:16,970
So definitely stay tuned on that.
544
00:19:17,429 --> 00:19:19,029
Yeah. I I I mean, I think that's
545
00:19:19,029 --> 00:19:21,509
really exciting. And, you know, we we we
546
00:19:21,509 --> 00:19:24,015
shouldn't forget that, okay, we might see a
547
00:19:24,095 --> 00:19:26,734
a huge breakthrough beyond the standard model of
548
00:19:26,734 --> 00:19:27,714
particle physics
549
00:19:28,015 --> 00:19:30,015
from the LHC, you know, in the high
550
00:19:30,015 --> 00:19:30,515
luminosity
551
00:19:30,894 --> 00:19:33,214
upgrade. But, you know, it's possible that,
552
00:19:33,855 --> 00:19:36,815
the big, big discovery at CERN will come
553
00:19:36,815 --> 00:19:38,670
from one of those antimatter
554
00:19:39,049 --> 00:19:39,549
factories.
555
00:19:39,850 --> 00:19:42,410
So, lot there's lots going on there. Isn't
556
00:19:42,410 --> 00:19:42,910
there?
557
00:19:43,529 --> 00:19:45,690
Yeah. And and people are also, you know,
558
00:19:45,690 --> 00:19:47,930
starting to think about what the next machine
559
00:19:47,930 --> 00:19:49,529
might look like. That's kind of the final
560
00:19:49,529 --> 00:19:50,350
sort of component.
561
00:19:51,815 --> 00:19:53,734
And that's interesting to me because the time
562
00:19:53,734 --> 00:19:56,375
scales are so long on that Mhmm. That
563
00:19:56,375 --> 00:19:58,875
the older generation of scientists will probably never
564
00:19:59,414 --> 00:20:00,954
get to work on that next machine,
565
00:20:01,255 --> 00:20:03,035
although they may live to see it built
566
00:20:03,174 --> 00:20:04,154
after they've retired.
567
00:20:04,640 --> 00:20:06,720
And even today's early career researchers will be
568
00:20:06,720 --> 00:20:08,720
well into their careers, maybe even heading towards
569
00:20:08,720 --> 00:20:10,559
retirement on their own before it gets going.
570
00:20:10,559 --> 00:20:12,100
You have to have a long term perspective.
571
00:20:12,400 --> 00:20:14,400
And you mentioned this question of antimatter following
572
00:20:14,400 --> 00:20:16,000
up. This is this is kind of relevant
573
00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:18,164
for me because one of the very first
574
00:20:18,164 --> 00:20:20,404
stories I ever wrote as a science journalist,
575
00:20:20,404 --> 00:20:21,625
as a student, an undergraduate,
576
00:20:22,484 --> 00:20:23,944
was about a researcher
577
00:20:24,325 --> 00:20:26,565
at my university who was interested in finding
578
00:20:26,565 --> 00:20:28,424
out whether antimatter fell up.
579
00:20:28,724 --> 00:20:29,784
And so when,
580
00:20:30,929 --> 00:20:33,669
you know, the the antimatter experiments at CERN
581
00:20:34,210 --> 00:20:36,289
found started finding evidence that it does in
582
00:20:36,289 --> 00:20:38,450
fact fall down just like normal matter, I
583
00:20:38,450 --> 00:20:40,129
mean, it's kind of disappointment. Right? Because you
584
00:20:40,129 --> 00:20:42,529
wanna see some Oh, yeah. Unusual physics. But
585
00:20:42,529 --> 00:20:44,434
it was also kind of, you know, it
586
00:20:44,434 --> 00:20:46,755
felt very satisfying for me even as an
587
00:20:46,755 --> 00:20:48,994
observer of this to sort of have finally
588
00:20:48,994 --> 00:20:50,375
found the answer to a question
589
00:20:50,755 --> 00:20:52,134
I was asking researchers,
590
00:20:52,674 --> 00:20:54,694
you know, twenty years ago as a student.
591
00:20:55,234 --> 00:20:57,095
So, you know, this is definitely,
592
00:20:57,670 --> 00:20:59,430
you have to have a long term perspective,
593
00:20:59,430 --> 00:21:01,509
I think, to be a particle physicist, to
594
00:21:01,509 --> 00:21:03,269
think not just about the discoveries that are
595
00:21:03,269 --> 00:21:05,130
happening now, but the discoveries
596
00:21:05,750 --> 00:21:07,430
that are gonna be made in the future
597
00:21:07,430 --> 00:21:08,869
and what you need to do to get
598
00:21:08,869 --> 00:21:10,549
there to have that happen. And that's where
599
00:21:10,549 --> 00:21:12,410
I think everything kinda comes together.
600
00:21:13,244 --> 00:21:15,345
You you mentioned the sort of next generation.
601
00:21:15,404 --> 00:21:17,644
So the I suppose the LHC is going
602
00:21:17,644 --> 00:21:19,184
to run-in its high luminosity
603
00:21:20,045 --> 00:21:22,605
mode and, you know, gather lots more data.
604
00:21:22,605 --> 00:21:25,164
But at some point, it's it's just gonna
605
00:21:25,164 --> 00:21:27,664
run out of of of road, I suppose.
606
00:21:29,039 --> 00:21:30,559
When you when you spoke to people at
607
00:21:30,559 --> 00:21:33,200
CERN, did you have any feeling for what
608
00:21:33,200 --> 00:21:34,900
they thought the next generation
609
00:21:35,679 --> 00:21:37,919
collider would be? What I mean, are people
610
00:21:37,919 --> 00:21:39,779
very keen on this humongous
611
00:21:40,159 --> 00:21:42,159
collider that would sort of go under Lake
612
00:21:42,159 --> 00:21:42,659
Geneva,
613
00:21:43,974 --> 00:21:46,454
you know, this hue but much larger version
614
00:21:46,454 --> 00:21:47,275
of the LHC
615
00:21:47,654 --> 00:21:50,214
at CERN, I suppose, or, you know, maybe
616
00:21:50,214 --> 00:21:53,494
a linear collider somewhere else, or is it
617
00:21:53,575 --> 00:21:54,875
it is I mean,
618
00:21:55,255 --> 00:21:57,095
so I I suppose the community has to
619
00:21:57,095 --> 00:21:59,039
decide on what it wants to do, but
620
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:02,000
to to to people there, is it still
621
00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:04,400
really far in the future, or are they
622
00:22:04,400 --> 00:22:06,580
focusing on the LHC at the moment?
623
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:08,880
I think that, you know, it probably depends
624
00:22:08,880 --> 00:22:10,720
on what level you're talking about. You know,
625
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:11,220
the
626
00:22:12,174 --> 00:22:15,695
Fabiola Gianati and, actually, the the upcoming CERN
627
00:22:15,695 --> 00:22:18,134
director general director general designate Mark Thompson, who
628
00:22:18,134 --> 00:22:19,454
I think was on the podcast a couple
629
00:22:19,454 --> 00:22:21,695
weeks ago. Mhmm. They're very much thinking about
630
00:22:21,695 --> 00:22:23,535
the long term future as well as thinking
631
00:22:23,535 --> 00:22:25,954
about how to run the the experiments
632
00:22:26,335 --> 00:22:28,970
and the the collider in its current operational
633
00:22:29,750 --> 00:22:31,589
phase. I think I get the impression that
634
00:22:31,589 --> 00:22:33,910
the CERN is very much pushing for the
635
00:22:33,910 --> 00:22:36,470
establishment of the future circular collider, as it's
636
00:22:36,470 --> 00:22:38,630
called, this this big, even bigger version of
637
00:22:38,630 --> 00:22:39,289
the LHC.
638
00:22:40,765 --> 00:22:42,285
But I think that you're you're right. The
639
00:22:42,285 --> 00:22:44,704
community still has to sort of decide because
640
00:22:44,845 --> 00:22:45,904
it's clear that,
641
00:22:46,684 --> 00:22:48,384
you know, we're we're gonna get,
642
00:22:50,365 --> 00:22:51,825
you know, no more than
643
00:22:52,940 --> 00:22:54,880
one or two big
644
00:22:55,180 --> 00:22:57,599
ex additional big machines like this.
645
00:22:58,220 --> 00:23:01,180
The Chinese government is talking about building some
646
00:23:01,180 --> 00:23:03,579
sort of high energy facility there. It's a
647
00:23:03,579 --> 00:23:05,599
question about whether that will happen independently
648
00:23:05,980 --> 00:23:07,984
of what's going on in Europe or, you
649
00:23:07,984 --> 00:23:09,285
know, maybe The US.
650
00:23:10,144 --> 00:23:11,585
And these things just have to still still
651
00:23:11,585 --> 00:23:12,785
have to sort of shake out in the
652
00:23:12,785 --> 00:23:14,005
in the wash, really.
653
00:23:14,785 --> 00:23:16,945
Yeah. Well, it it'll be very interesting to
654
00:23:16,945 --> 00:23:17,845
see what happens.
655
00:23:18,144 --> 00:23:19,744
And, you know, for I mean, for our
656
00:23:19,744 --> 00:23:20,244
listeners,
657
00:23:21,590 --> 00:23:23,029
I mean, I think you'd agree with me,
658
00:23:23,029 --> 00:23:23,910
Margaret, that,
659
00:23:24,390 --> 00:23:26,950
CERN is a great day out. And I
660
00:23:26,950 --> 00:23:28,150
I don't think you have to be a
661
00:23:28,150 --> 00:23:29,289
member of the press
662
00:23:29,590 --> 00:23:31,990
to go. I think they do maybe do
663
00:23:31,990 --> 00:23:34,230
they have an open day every year? I
664
00:23:34,230 --> 00:23:36,470
know, certainly, one of our colleagues is gone
665
00:23:36,470 --> 00:23:38,785
as a sort of a normal citizen.
666
00:23:39,404 --> 00:23:41,404
Oh, yeah. You you can absolutely day. You
667
00:23:41,404 --> 00:23:43,565
can absolutely tour tour CERN as as an
668
00:23:43,565 --> 00:23:45,724
ordinary citizen. I believe it's actually the top
669
00:23:45,724 --> 00:23:48,845
ranked activity in Geneva on TripAdvisor or maybe
670
00:23:48,845 --> 00:23:51,329
the second after going to Lake Geneva itself.
671
00:23:51,809 --> 00:23:53,169
So, you know, you may not be able
672
00:23:53,169 --> 00:23:54,849
to go down and see the ATLAS detector
673
00:23:54,849 --> 00:23:56,450
like I did, but you can certainly go
674
00:23:56,450 --> 00:23:58,710
and, you know, have a look around the,
675
00:23:58,769 --> 00:24:00,769
you know, the control center and look around
676
00:24:00,769 --> 00:24:02,529
the the buildings on campus and as part
677
00:24:02,529 --> 00:24:04,369
of a a public tour group. And, yeah,
678
00:24:04,369 --> 00:24:06,335
it's it's whatever you get to see is
679
00:24:06,335 --> 00:24:09,134
absolutely impressive. Mhmm. There's also really, a really
680
00:24:09,134 --> 00:24:11,774
good museum there, the the CERN Gateway. Mhmm.
681
00:24:11,774 --> 00:24:13,934
That's, I think that's probably, like, number four
682
00:24:13,934 --> 00:24:15,134
on the list of things to do in
683
00:24:15,294 --> 00:24:17,534
if you go to visit visit Geneva. So
684
00:24:17,534 --> 00:24:19,154
that's also a a great attraction.
685
00:24:19,669 --> 00:24:21,769
Great. Well, thanks for the update, Margaret.
686
00:24:22,309 --> 00:24:24,250
You're welcome, Hamish. Nice to talk to you.
687
00:24:32,115 --> 00:24:34,755
That was Margaret Harris, and there'll be much
688
00:24:34,755 --> 00:24:38,295
more about CERN from Margaret in physics world,
689
00:24:38,434 --> 00:24:39,734
so stay tuned.
690
00:24:40,595 --> 00:24:43,634
Twenty twenty five is the international year of
691
00:24:43,634 --> 00:24:45,414
quantum science and technology,
692
00:24:46,170 --> 00:24:46,910
and celebrations
693
00:24:47,450 --> 00:24:48,590
are well underway
694
00:24:49,210 --> 00:24:50,830
here at Physics World.
695
00:24:51,450 --> 00:24:53,630
Our latest contribution to the festivities
696
00:24:53,930 --> 00:24:57,309
is a fun quiz about all things quantum,
697
00:24:57,850 --> 00:25:01,230
and here are three of my favorite questions.
698
00:25:02,534 --> 00:25:03,434
Which celebrity
699
00:25:03,815 --> 00:25:05,674
was spotted in the audience
700
00:25:06,054 --> 00:25:09,835
at a meeting about quantum computers and music
701
00:25:10,214 --> 00:25:12,585
in London in December
702
00:25:12,585 --> 00:25:13,595
2022?
703
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:15,820
Was it Peter Andre,
704
00:25:16,360 --> 00:25:17,340
Peter Capaldi,
705
00:25:17,960 --> 00:25:18,779
Peter Gabriel,
706
00:25:19,320 --> 00:25:20,779
or Peter Schmeichel?
707
00:25:21,320 --> 00:25:24,299
So which one of those Peters is interested
708
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:26,380
in quantum music?
709
00:25:28,335 --> 00:25:31,474
The next question is which of the following
710
00:25:31,615 --> 00:25:34,115
versions of the quantum hall effect
711
00:25:34,494 --> 00:25:36,035
has not been observed
712
00:25:36,494 --> 00:25:38,035
so far in the lab?
713
00:25:38,815 --> 00:25:41,634
Is it the fractional quantum hall effect,
714
00:25:42,130 --> 00:25:43,190
the anomalous
715
00:25:43,569 --> 00:25:45,509
fractional quantum hall effect,
716
00:25:45,970 --> 00:25:46,869
the anyonic
717
00:25:47,490 --> 00:25:49,429
fractional quantum hall effect,
718
00:25:49,730 --> 00:25:51,190
or the excitonic
719
00:25:51,890 --> 00:25:53,990
fractional quantum hall effect?
720
00:25:54,369 --> 00:25:55,990
So which of those effects
721
00:25:56,565 --> 00:25:59,065
hasn't been observed in the lab?
722
00:25:59,764 --> 00:26:00,585
And finally,
723
00:26:01,044 --> 00:26:02,105
what destroyed
724
00:26:02,484 --> 00:26:03,224
the Helgoland
725
00:26:04,085 --> 00:26:04,585
guesthouse
726
00:26:05,125 --> 00:26:06,664
where Werner Heisenberg
727
00:26:06,964 --> 00:26:09,704
stayed in 1925
728
00:26:10,005 --> 00:26:10,825
while developing
729
00:26:11,460 --> 00:26:12,200
quantum mechanics.
730
00:26:12,980 --> 00:26:14,440
Was it a bomb,
731
00:26:14,900 --> 00:26:17,480
a gas leak, a rat infestation,
732
00:26:18,259 --> 00:26:19,480
or a storm?
733
00:26:20,259 --> 00:26:23,299
The quiz has 15 more questions to test
734
00:26:23,299 --> 00:26:24,919
your quantum knowledge,
735
00:26:25,335 --> 00:26:27,255
and you can find it on the Physics
736
00:26:27,255 --> 00:26:28,154
World website.
737
00:26:28,934 --> 00:26:30,234
Just look for the headline,
738
00:26:30,694 --> 00:26:34,474
test your quantum knowledge in this fun quiz.
739
00:26:36,375 --> 00:26:39,994
The commercial quantum technology sector is burgeoning,
740
00:26:40,509 --> 00:26:43,069
and I'm sure that some podcast listeners are
741
00:26:43,069 --> 00:26:44,450
keen on pursuing
742
00:26:44,829 --> 00:26:45,890
quantum careers.
743
00:26:46,589 --> 00:26:48,450
So if you'd like some inspiration
744
00:26:48,990 --> 00:26:50,849
and a few tips for success,
745
00:26:51,390 --> 00:26:53,809
check out our interview with Michelle
746
00:26:54,109 --> 00:26:54,609
Lawley,
747
00:26:55,015 --> 00:26:56,234
who is an advanced
748
00:26:56,535 --> 00:26:57,515
laser scientist
749
00:26:57,894 --> 00:26:58,794
at Quantinium.
750
00:26:59,894 --> 00:27:02,075
There, she supports the design,
751
00:27:02,454 --> 00:27:02,954
development,
752
00:27:03,335 --> 00:27:04,075
and construction
753
00:27:04,615 --> 00:27:05,515
of complex
754
00:27:05,894 --> 00:27:06,954
optical systems
755
00:27:07,359 --> 00:27:10,740
that will serve as the foundations of quantum
756
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:11,380
computers.
757
00:27:12,319 --> 00:27:14,819
After studying finance at university,
758
00:27:15,440 --> 00:27:18,419
Michelle worked for several years as an investment
759
00:27:18,720 --> 00:27:19,220
banker.
760
00:27:19,964 --> 00:27:23,744
But after reading a scientific paper about quantum
761
00:27:23,964 --> 00:27:24,464
teleportation,
762
00:27:25,484 --> 00:27:28,224
she packed that in to become a physicist,
763
00:27:29,005 --> 00:27:30,384
gaining a PhD
764
00:27:30,845 --> 00:27:32,464
in quantum optics.
765
00:27:33,190 --> 00:27:36,170
You can read all about her career shift
766
00:27:36,309 --> 00:27:39,529
in the article From Banking to Michelle
767
00:27:41,269 --> 00:27:41,769
Lawley's
768
00:27:42,070 --> 00:27:43,369
Unique Journey.
769
00:27:43,910 --> 00:27:46,144
And you can find that on the Physics
770
00:27:46,285 --> 00:27:47,345
World website.
771
00:27:48,285 --> 00:27:50,125
I'm afraid that's all the time we have
772
00:27:50,125 --> 00:27:51,424
for this week's podcast.
773
00:27:51,805 --> 00:27:54,924
Thanks to Margaret Harris for speaking to me
774
00:27:54,924 --> 00:27:57,904
today, and a special thanks to our producer,
775
00:27:58,285 --> 00:27:59,265
Fred Isles.
776
00:27:59,940 --> 00:28:02,419
We'll be back again next week. See you
777
00:28:02,419 --> 00:28:02,919
then.
00:00:09,279 --> 00:00:12,320
Hello, and welcome to the Physics World Weekly
2
00:00:12,320 --> 00:00:14,339
podcast. I'm Hamish Johnston.
3
00:00:15,205 --> 00:00:16,664
The European Organization
4
00:00:17,045 --> 00:00:18,585
for Nuclear Research
5
00:00:18,885 --> 00:00:19,864
or CERN
6
00:00:20,164 --> 00:00:23,545
was founded in Geneva in 1954.
7
00:00:24,164 --> 00:00:27,625
Today, it's most famous for the Large Hadron
8
00:00:27,684 --> 00:00:28,184
Collider,
9
00:00:28,789 --> 00:00:29,689
which accelerates
10
00:00:30,149 --> 00:00:31,609
protons and nuclei
11
00:00:32,229 --> 00:00:33,530
in opposite directions
12
00:00:34,070 --> 00:00:35,750
around a 27
13
00:00:35,750 --> 00:00:39,129
kilometer ring before smashing them together
14
00:00:39,509 --> 00:00:40,649
at high energies.
15
00:00:41,505 --> 00:00:42,725
In 2012,
16
00:00:43,024 --> 00:00:44,965
'2 experiments on the LHC
17
00:00:45,424 --> 00:00:48,804
announced the discovery of the long sought after
18
00:00:49,024 --> 00:00:50,004
Higgs boson.
19
00:00:50,625 --> 00:00:53,364
And that's just one of the many important
20
00:00:53,504 --> 00:00:54,004
breakthroughs
21
00:00:54,545 --> 00:00:55,765
made at the lab.
22
00:00:56,390 --> 00:00:59,609
But CERN isn't just about colliding particles.
23
00:01:00,149 --> 00:01:02,809
It's a leader in the study of antimatter,
24
00:01:03,509 --> 00:01:05,750
the place where the world wide web was
25
00:01:05,750 --> 00:01:06,250
invented.
26
00:01:06,870 --> 00:01:09,290
And CERN was home to John Bell,
27
00:01:09,745 --> 00:01:11,045
whose famous theorem
28
00:01:11,424 --> 00:01:12,325
marked a profound
29
00:01:12,625 --> 00:01:14,965
step forward in our understanding
30
00:01:15,344 --> 00:01:16,644
of quantum physics.
31
00:01:17,584 --> 00:01:20,385
In this podcast, I'm joined by my physics
32
00:01:20,385 --> 00:01:23,719
world colleague, Margaret Harris, who is back from
33
00:01:23,719 --> 00:01:26,519
a visit to CERN with an update on
34
00:01:26,519 --> 00:01:27,420
the exciting
35
00:01:27,719 --> 00:01:29,980
physics that's being done there.
36
00:01:30,359 --> 00:01:31,180
Hi, Margaret.
37
00:01:31,560 --> 00:01:32,780
Welcome to the podcast.
38
00:01:33,799 --> 00:01:34,540
Hi, Amish.
39
00:01:35,275 --> 00:01:38,254
Now if there's one lab that every physicist
40
00:01:38,555 --> 00:01:41,674
should visit once in their lifetime, it's got
41
00:01:41,674 --> 00:01:42,575
to be CERN,
42
00:01:42,875 --> 00:01:44,334
the the sort of preeminent,
43
00:01:45,274 --> 00:01:48,414
particle physics lab in Europe and and maybe
44
00:01:48,715 --> 00:01:49,614
in the world.
45
00:01:50,630 --> 00:01:52,730
What was it like? How would you describe,
46
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your trip? What's it like being at CERN?
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Certainly, at the moment, it is the world's
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premier high energy physics laboratory.
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And I was told by one of my
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tour guides,
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Sarah Aldewelt, who's an early career researcher at
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the University of Edinburgh when she's not working
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at the ATLAS detector at CERN. She said
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that this is an interesting time to visit
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CERN, and I hope to have her on
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the podcast at some point to explain this
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in more detail.
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But, essentially, if you're a particle physicist, you
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have several possible modes of operation.
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You can be in data taking mode. You
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can be in data analysis mode, so dealing
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with the data you've already got, and you
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can be in the upgrading the experiment mode,
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or you can be thinking about future upgrades.
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And future in that in this case could
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mean five years from now or could mean,
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in extreme cases, you know, up to fifty
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years away.
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And right now, CERN is operating in all
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but one of those modes. There wasn't any
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data collection when I was going on because
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the collider shut down over the winter.
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This is to save on electricity costs,
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and also to help avoid putting too much
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demand on the French or Swiss
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electrical grids at a time when demand for
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heating is already high.
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The it's funny. The the LHC actually requires
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as much electricity as the entire city of
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Geneva when it's running. This is the Large
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Hadron Collider, the main collider at CERN. Wow.
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So so there's no new science data being
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generated during the winter,
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but absolutely everything else is happening right now.
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In a couple months months, there'll be spring.
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The LHC will restart.
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But then in 2026, it will enter a
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longer shutdown, one that will last all the
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way until 2030,
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during which it will get what will probably
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end up being its last major upgrade.
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So unlike a previous upgrade where they went
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from colliding protons at energies of five oh,
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so sorry. Seven teraelectron
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volts
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TeV
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to clotting them at 14 TeV,
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this upgrade isn't an energy increase.
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Instead, it's an increase in luminosity.
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Now what's that mean? Well, the the beep
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beams of the LHC are made up of
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bunches of protons,
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and every bunch contains about a hundred billion
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protons.
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But because protons are so small, the vast
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majority of them don't collide when you cross
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the beams.
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You might get a few tens of collisions
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per crossing.
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Now that might sound really low, but because
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those crossings happen 40,000,000 times per second, you
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do still get a lot of data.
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In fact, you get so much data that
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CERN pioneered the handling of big data, and
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they have really complex algorithms to help them
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decide which data points to keep for future
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analysis
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and which to throw away because they're not
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gonna be very interesting.
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But the high luminosity
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upgrade is going to bring that up to
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200 collisions per crossing. So now you're talking
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about an order of magnitude more data that
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could be generated per unit time.
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And and this high luminosity upgrade, I mean,
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it's not just simply a matter of pumping
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more,
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protons into the accelerator. I mean, I'll I
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mean, just about am I right in thinking
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that just about every aspect
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of the LHC and and the experiments that
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are on it have to be
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modified
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or tweaked in some way
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just to to to achieve this?
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Certainly, the the two main,
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biggest experiments,
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ATLAS and CMS, have have to undergo major
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tweaks for this.
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So but I think there's actually 17 different
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work packages involved, and I saw only two
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of them. So I can tell you about
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those two. I don't know about the the
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totality of the upgrades going on.
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But the first upgrade that I saw on
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my tour involved something called a crab cavity.
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And what these cavities do is that they
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tilt the proton bunches
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so the protons in them appear to be
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moving sideways like a crab walks.
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Oh, that's why it's called a crab cavity.
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Yeah. That's why it's called a crab cavity.
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I always wondered about that. Well, listeners, you
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learn something new every day.
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They don't look anything like a crab.
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But the reason they they want to make
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the move sideways is because at the moment,
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the beams of the LHC cross
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I mean, it's not at right angles exactly.
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It's more like a sort of flattened x
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shape,
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but the area overlap isn't huge.
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But once the crab cavity is installed, they'll
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get a much fuller overlap. So if you
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can imagine this difference between placing your two
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fists in a cross at the wrists and
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aligning your hands so that your entire arms
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are sort of all crossing in front of
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you.
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And that means every proton in a bunch
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is gonna have to pass through the whole
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length of the bunch moving in the opposite
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direction.
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And that on its own will increase the
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number of collisions per crossing
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by around 20%.
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Now of course if you're getting more collisions
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you're also gonna need a detector and readout
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electronics that can handle that. And that's where
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the other work package I saw, the inner
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tracker or ITK
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systems upgrade
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comes in. And this is gonna become the
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new heart of the ATLAS detector. I guess
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you could say the detector is having a
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heart transplant effectively.
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And right now, this inner tracker doesn't look
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like much. It looks like an empty tube.
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It's about as tall as I am with
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slots in it, and these slots are gonna
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be filled by long
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strip like silicon based sensors.
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I see. And I have to say, Margaret,
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I'm very, very jealous that you got to
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see,
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ATLAS. I mean, I I I suppose that's
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one of the bonuses of visiting CERN when
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the,
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collider isn't running, that you could actually
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go down and see the experiment.
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So what what what was that like? Was
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it I mean, you you hear stories of
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it being huge.
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How huge is it? Can you can you
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can you give us, I don't know. Is
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is is it small office building huge or,
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what's the story? Yeah. It's I don't know
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the exact numbers. It's several stories tall. It's
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a hundred meters underground.
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To get in there, you have to go
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through a security system that's sort of like
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walking into a if you can imagine that,
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an old fashioned telephone booth with a door
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on the front and a door in the
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back. So you walk into the the front
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of the telephone booth. You stand on a
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a square
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that is apparently like testing your weight as
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well as sort of scanning you like an
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airport scanner.
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And
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then the doors open, you get to go
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out. And if you're carrying anything and you
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want to carry some tools or a backpack
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or anything like that, it has to go
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through a separate slot.
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And they they were a little bit cagey
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about exactly what this is doing, but it's
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essentially making sure
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that everybody is counted in and counted back
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out and that the same people go in
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as come out and they're not they're not
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carrying
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undue amounts of extra stuff with them while
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either on the way in
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or on the way out.
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So you can, you know, appreciate the sort
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of security. It's it's both for security and
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also for safety. You don't want there to
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be an incident. You forget that there's one
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of your people is still down a hundred
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meters underground. Yeah. So so it's got there's
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a lot a lot of preamble or build
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up to it. And then you get down
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to the detector itself, and it's absolutely enormous.
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And I think
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the thing that that most impressed me about
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it, this enormous machine, it's probably one of
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the biggest machines
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that humankind has ever constructed.
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The thing that most impressed me about it
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was the cable ties. And that's not because
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cable ties were impressive or because they were
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really fancy or whatever. It's because each of
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those cable ties, and I could probably see
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hundreds from just where I was standing, each
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of them was put in place by a
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human being who knew exactly what he or
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she was was doing,
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and they had to be put together in
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this whole giant machine was fabricated entirely by
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hand, by human hands and human brains who
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knew exactly what they were doing. And that's
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just, I think that's that's the thing that
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got me about the detector, not its sheer
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size or the fact that there's, you know,
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above you, there's a hole in the ceiling
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that lets new new components be lowered down.
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It was seeing those cable ties and just
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realizing
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the immense amount of effort that went into
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to making this this machine.
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And I I I suppose the information that
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flows through a lot of those cables is,
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you know, just a tiny bit of the
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information that the the detector produces, and then
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that that's all put together
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Yeah. You know, to tell you, you you
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know, to tell physicists about,
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the details of a of a collision. Yeah.
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It is it is just amazing, really. I
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mean, I've never seen ATLAS. I have seen
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CMS, which I don't I don't think is
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quite as big, but it was,
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it was definitely impressive. So so was ATLAS
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was it more or less intact when you
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saw it, or had they was it taken
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apart? Was it in pieces on the floor
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or sort of halfway in between?
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I mean, it looked pretty intact to me.
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There wasn't a big, gigantic chunk missing, which
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is absolutely what will happen when they put
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this, this new ITK,
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inner tracker in.
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And one of the advantages of this new
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design that goes in is that it should
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be more
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radiation hard than the inner detector that's in
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Atlas now.
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The scientists have showed me around the Integration
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Hall where this, inner tracker is being assembled
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before it gets lowered through that that
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hole in the roof down a hundred meters
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underground.
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They said that the existing detector would actually
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need replacing anyway even if they weren't doing
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this high luminosity upgrade
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because it's absorbed so much radiation over the,
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you know, decade or more that it's been
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in ATLAS.
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It's absorbed so much radiation from the all
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the particle collisions and all the the debris
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of those collisions that it's becoming harder to
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supply enough voltage to deplete the silicon in
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the detector itself. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah. So,
316
00:11:13,179 --> 00:11:15,259
you know, this is is you don't think
317
00:11:15,500 --> 00:11:17,419
I personally don't think of the LHC as
318
00:11:17,419 --> 00:11:19,340
being that older device, but it's actually you
319
00:11:19,340 --> 00:11:21,019
know, it's been going for quite a while,
320
00:11:21,019 --> 00:11:23,179
and there's there are thing there are things
321
00:11:23,259 --> 00:11:24,169
there there's,
322
00:11:24,965 --> 00:11:26,884
you know, a lot of of science has
323
00:11:26,884 --> 00:11:28,884
been done about the auxiliary systems that go
324
00:11:28,884 --> 00:11:30,565
into it. You know, think of where silicon
325
00:11:30,565 --> 00:11:31,065
semiconductor
326
00:11:31,445 --> 00:11:34,165
electronics was in, I don't know, the early
327
00:11:34,165 --> 00:11:36,165
two thousands when they were designing and building
328
00:11:36,165 --> 00:11:37,764
this thing, and think about where it is
329
00:11:37,764 --> 00:11:39,205
now. You know, there's a real reason for
330
00:11:39,205 --> 00:11:41,419
upgrades that have, you know, all everything to
331
00:11:41,419 --> 00:11:43,179
do with lots of different areas of of
332
00:11:43,179 --> 00:11:43,679
science,
333
00:11:44,059 --> 00:11:45,440
not just particle physics.
334
00:11:45,980 --> 00:11:47,419
So the new system can deal with a
335
00:11:47,419 --> 00:11:48,480
higher number of collisions,
336
00:11:49,580 --> 00:11:51,580
as well as being able to to cope
337
00:11:51,580 --> 00:11:53,360
with, the the radiation.
338
00:11:53,795 --> 00:11:56,595
It's just far more granular, faster channels, faster
339
00:11:56,595 --> 00:11:57,095
electronics.
340
00:11:57,875 --> 00:12:00,434
Right. And the the the other thing I
341
00:12:00,434 --> 00:12:01,495
I remember is
342
00:12:02,675 --> 00:12:04,375
when you go to see these detectors,
343
00:12:04,915 --> 00:12:07,394
you you actually have to leave the main
344
00:12:07,394 --> 00:12:08,535
site of,
345
00:12:09,690 --> 00:12:11,690
of CERN, don't you? At least with CMS.
346
00:12:11,690 --> 00:12:13,290
So is did you have to get on
347
00:12:13,290 --> 00:12:14,889
a bus and sort of go across the
348
00:12:14,889 --> 00:12:16,570
border into France? And,
349
00:12:17,129 --> 00:12:19,070
you know, did they tell you to
350
00:12:19,610 --> 00:12:21,870
remember your passport just in case?
351
00:12:23,084 --> 00:12:24,924
They didn't mention the passport. My phone was
352
00:12:24,924 --> 00:12:26,445
going off all the time saying, welcome to
353
00:12:26,445 --> 00:12:28,764
France. Welcome to Switzerland. You have this much
354
00:12:28,764 --> 00:12:30,924
data on your your plan. So I guess
355
00:12:30,924 --> 00:12:33,404
that that was actually the only indication I
356
00:12:33,404 --> 00:12:34,924
had that we were crossing the border at
357
00:12:34,924 --> 00:12:37,200
the particular places I went because it is,
358
00:12:37,360 --> 00:12:39,540
you know, relatively open border. There are checkpoints,
359
00:12:39,600 --> 00:12:40,580
but, you know, there's
360
00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:43,120
it's part of Central Europe. There's a lot
361
00:12:43,120 --> 00:12:44,799
of of freedom to cross the border, which
362
00:12:44,799 --> 00:12:47,040
is good for the scientists to work there
363
00:12:47,040 --> 00:12:48,320
because a lot of them live in France
364
00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:50,340
and then work in Switzerland or vice versa.
365
00:12:51,785 --> 00:12:53,625
But yeah. No. It it's I think one
366
00:12:53,625 --> 00:12:55,465
people we I spoke to said that he
367
00:12:55,465 --> 00:12:57,545
he compares it. He's from from Glasgow originally.
368
00:12:57,545 --> 00:12:59,625
He compares it to Glasgow subway system in
369
00:12:59,625 --> 00:13:01,705
terms of the the length of it. Oh,
370
00:13:01,705 --> 00:13:03,705
that's famously a big loop, isn't it? The
371
00:13:03,705 --> 00:13:07,019
Glasgow subway system. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because I
372
00:13:07,019 --> 00:13:08,699
I, you know, I I've been discerned twice,
373
00:13:08,699 --> 00:13:09,980
and I think the first time was in
374
00:13:09,980 --> 00:13:12,459
the nineties. And back then, you know, whatever
375
00:13:12,459 --> 00:13:14,399
the arrangement was between France
376
00:13:14,940 --> 00:13:15,839
and Switzerland,
377
00:13:16,220 --> 00:13:18,240
there was actually a border
378
00:13:18,955 --> 00:13:20,875
to cross, you know, there there was a
379
00:13:20,875 --> 00:13:22,575
kiosk there with somebody,
380
00:13:22,955 --> 00:13:25,054
you know, we I had to flash my
381
00:13:25,195 --> 00:13:27,195
passport, and we drove through. But then the
382
00:13:27,195 --> 00:13:29,434
second time, yeah, as you say, the the
383
00:13:29,434 --> 00:13:31,534
border had magically disappeared
384
00:13:32,500 --> 00:13:34,279
as it has in, yeah,
385
00:13:34,899 --> 00:13:35,559
in a lot
386
00:13:36,100 --> 00:13:36,679
of Europe.
387
00:13:37,299 --> 00:13:39,059
It's certainly a softer border than it than
388
00:13:39,059 --> 00:13:41,079
it has been sometimes in the past. Yeah.
389
00:13:41,379 --> 00:13:42,579
So so Margaret, the
390
00:13:43,379 --> 00:13:45,459
we've got this where we will have this
391
00:13:45,459 --> 00:13:46,200
high luminosity
392
00:13:47,245 --> 00:13:50,365
LHC running at some point in the future.
393
00:13:50,365 --> 00:13:52,444
What what does that mean for the the
394
00:13:52,444 --> 00:13:52,944
physics
395
00:13:53,245 --> 00:13:55,985
that's being done at experiments like ATLAS?
396
00:13:56,684 --> 00:13:58,845
Why is it important to to see more
397
00:13:58,845 --> 00:13:59,345
collisions?
398
00:14:00,600 --> 00:14:02,220
Well, it will allow the
399
00:14:02,679 --> 00:14:03,419
the the two,
400
00:14:03,879 --> 00:14:06,759
high energy physics experiments at the LHC, ATLAS
401
00:14:06,759 --> 00:14:09,480
and CMS, to collect 10 times more data
402
00:14:09,480 --> 00:14:10,700
than they have now,
403
00:14:11,240 --> 00:14:13,399
and to explore the energy frontier with more
404
00:14:13,399 --> 00:14:14,539
potential for discovery.
405
00:14:15,024 --> 00:14:16,384
And this is kind of amazing to me.
406
00:14:16,384 --> 00:14:17,985
You know, the LHC has been running off
407
00:14:17,985 --> 00:14:19,845
and on since 02/2008,
408
00:14:20,225 --> 00:14:22,304
but it's actually only collected 10% of the
409
00:14:22,304 --> 00:14:24,544
data it's ever going to collect. It will
410
00:14:24,544 --> 00:14:26,084
get the remaining 90%
411
00:14:26,384 --> 00:14:28,384
during this high Lumi run, which is scheduled
412
00:14:28,384 --> 00:14:29,764
last from 2030
413
00:14:30,059 --> 00:14:32,320
through to about 2040 or thereabouts.
414
00:14:33,019 --> 00:14:33,519
And
415
00:14:33,899 --> 00:14:36,460
a key focus for the high luminosity LHC
416
00:14:36,460 --> 00:14:38,539
will be studying something something called a dye
417
00:14:38,539 --> 00:14:40,860
Higgs event, which is not where the Higgs
418
00:14:40,860 --> 00:14:41,835
boson dies.
419
00:14:42,394 --> 00:14:44,654
It's where you create not one Higgs boson,
420
00:14:44,715 --> 00:14:46,175
but two of them at once.
421
00:14:46,715 --> 00:14:48,795
And once you have two Higgs boson at
422
00:14:48,795 --> 00:14:51,035
once, that means you can study what happens
423
00:14:51,035 --> 00:14:52,975
when the Higgs interacts with itself.
424
00:14:53,995 --> 00:14:57,029
Fabiola Giannati, who's the current CERN director general,
425
00:14:57,029 --> 00:14:58,250
called this self interaction
426
00:14:58,870 --> 00:15:01,509
a portal to exploring interactions in the early
427
00:15:01,509 --> 00:15:02,009
universe.
428
00:15:02,710 --> 00:15:05,190
So within about a picosecond or ten to
429
00:15:05,190 --> 00:15:07,129
the minus twelve seconds of the big bang,
430
00:15:07,350 --> 00:15:09,429
this is when the Higgs field first became
431
00:15:09,429 --> 00:15:09,929
established.
432
00:15:10,514 --> 00:15:12,355
And so understanding how that came about is
433
00:15:12,355 --> 00:15:15,975
crucial to understanding how initially massless elementary particles
434
00:15:16,595 --> 00:15:18,595
end up gaining mass by interacting with this
435
00:15:18,595 --> 00:15:21,095
Higgs field and turning into the massive quarks
436
00:15:21,154 --> 00:15:23,174
and electrons we see around us today,
437
00:15:23,570 --> 00:15:25,169
which are what you need to be have
438
00:15:25,169 --> 00:15:26,709
in order to form atoms.
439
00:15:27,490 --> 00:15:29,889
And this Higgs pair production also has some
440
00:15:29,889 --> 00:15:30,389
implications
441
00:15:31,089 --> 00:15:34,209
for matter, antimatter asymmetry. So we might learn
442
00:15:34,209 --> 00:15:35,110
about that too.
443
00:15:35,735 --> 00:15:37,995
I see. And, I mean,
444
00:15:39,014 --> 00:15:41,575
the LHC and, you know, that sort of
445
00:15:41,575 --> 00:15:44,375
high energy particle physics is not the only
446
00:15:44,375 --> 00:15:44,875
science
447
00:15:45,335 --> 00:15:47,815
that's done at CERN. And, you know, to
448
00:15:47,815 --> 00:15:49,675
me, I think one of the most interesting,
449
00:15:50,769 --> 00:15:51,269
group,
450
00:15:51,649 --> 00:15:53,250
of experiments that,
451
00:15:53,649 --> 00:15:55,730
are being done there at the moment are
452
00:15:55,730 --> 00:15:56,470
the antimatter
453
00:15:57,009 --> 00:15:59,649
experiments. And I think you you also paid
454
00:15:59,649 --> 00:16:01,750
a visit to the was it the antimatter
455
00:16:01,889 --> 00:16:04,445
factory? Do I have that right? At Yeah.
456
00:16:04,605 --> 00:16:07,024
At CERN. Yeah. The antimatter factory.
457
00:16:07,804 --> 00:16:08,945
There's actually I think
458
00:16:09,325 --> 00:16:10,384
it's a little bit,
459
00:16:11,485 --> 00:16:13,644
question of what the boundary between different experiments
460
00:16:13,644 --> 00:16:15,644
lies, but I think there's actually five experiments
461
00:16:15,644 --> 00:16:16,945
at the antimatter factory.
462
00:16:17,389 --> 00:16:20,110
And all of them are in various ways
463
00:16:20,110 --> 00:16:22,289
and with different techniques looking for differences,
464
00:16:22,750 --> 00:16:25,389
actually, between the matter and look exploring this
465
00:16:25,389 --> 00:16:27,250
matter antimatter asymmetry asymmetry
466
00:16:27,629 --> 00:16:29,389
in a different way. They're looking for differences
467
00:16:29,389 --> 00:16:31,894
between the behavior of matter and the behavior
468
00:16:31,954 --> 00:16:32,454
antimatter,
469
00:16:33,074 --> 00:16:35,554
whether that's the behavior antimatter under gravity as
470
00:16:35,554 --> 00:16:38,534
with the alpha g, g bar, and AEGIS
471
00:16:38,914 --> 00:16:42,274
experiments, or different magnetic moments as with the
472
00:16:42,274 --> 00:16:45,574
base experiments or spectra as with, the
473
00:16:45,970 --> 00:16:47,110
Asakusa experiments.
474
00:16:47,649 --> 00:16:49,409
I see. And and and the reason this
475
00:16:49,409 --> 00:16:50,230
is important,
476
00:16:50,929 --> 00:16:52,850
is that what we know that at least
477
00:16:52,850 --> 00:16:54,149
in the visible universe,
478
00:16:54,690 --> 00:16:57,830
there's much more matter than antimatter.
479
00:16:58,325 --> 00:17:00,325
And if we could we we could sort
480
00:17:00,325 --> 00:17:03,225
of work out why by looking for differences
481
00:17:03,445 --> 00:17:06,085
between the two, that could that could tell
482
00:17:06,085 --> 00:17:06,984
us a lot
483
00:17:07,285 --> 00:17:09,545
about, well, what we don't know
484
00:17:09,924 --> 00:17:10,825
about physics.
485
00:17:11,880 --> 00:17:13,799
So so what, I mean I mean, I
486
00:17:13,799 --> 00:17:15,880
think, you know, the most famous experiment that
487
00:17:15,880 --> 00:17:18,359
was that's been done there is, you know,
488
00:17:18,359 --> 00:17:19,500
testing this idea
489
00:17:19,880 --> 00:17:20,859
that does antimatter
490
00:17:21,160 --> 00:17:22,059
fall up,
491
00:17:22,840 --> 00:17:24,539
or, you know, does it somehow
492
00:17:25,080 --> 00:17:26,460
respond to gravity
493
00:17:26,944 --> 00:17:28,704
in a different way? And I think this
494
00:17:28,785 --> 00:17:31,825
so far, the answer is no. But there's
495
00:17:31,825 --> 00:17:35,265
lots of really interesting experiments there, aren't there?
496
00:17:35,265 --> 00:17:36,164
Doing spectroscopy
497
00:17:36,785 --> 00:17:39,184
on anti atoms and
498
00:17:39,505 --> 00:17:41,585
I mean, it's some amazing stuff they do
499
00:17:41,585 --> 00:17:44,450
there when you consider that antimatter doesn't really
500
00:17:44,450 --> 00:17:46,390
want to hang around for too long.
501
00:17:47,089 --> 00:17:47,589
No.
502
00:17:47,890 --> 00:17:50,130
And I think this area of CERN actually
503
00:17:50,289 --> 00:17:52,210
you know, I'm talking about the Hi Lumi
504
00:17:52,210 --> 00:17:54,450
upgrade for ATLAS and CMS, but this area
505
00:17:54,450 --> 00:17:56,690
of CERN actually had its big upgrade relatively
506
00:17:56,690 --> 00:17:57,190
recently.
507
00:17:58,744 --> 00:18:00,365
As recently as 2018,
508
00:18:00,424 --> 00:18:03,384
each of those animator experiments got eight hours
509
00:18:03,384 --> 00:18:05,704
of beam time per day, which is, you
510
00:18:05,704 --> 00:18:07,224
know, a decent working day, but, you know,
511
00:18:07,224 --> 00:18:08,505
you've got a machine. You could run it
512
00:18:08,505 --> 00:18:10,284
twenty four seven if you wanted to.
513
00:18:11,910 --> 00:18:14,070
But due to an upgrade of the Elena
514
00:18:14,070 --> 00:18:14,570
ring
515
00:18:14,950 --> 00:18:16,410
that provides actually slower
516
00:18:16,950 --> 00:18:19,450
particles, everywhere else at CERN wants fast particles,
517
00:18:19,750 --> 00:18:21,769
the antimatter factory wants slower particles.
518
00:18:23,190 --> 00:18:26,355
This Elena ring upgrade provides half a million
519
00:18:26,355 --> 00:18:28,455
anti protons per two minute shot,
520
00:18:28,914 --> 00:18:31,494
and that became fully operational in 2021.
521
00:18:31,555 --> 00:18:33,714
And now it delivers anti protons to four
522
00:18:33,714 --> 00:18:36,275
experiments at once twenty four seven while it's
523
00:18:36,275 --> 00:18:36,775
running.
524
00:18:37,234 --> 00:18:38,835
And what that means is that alpha, which
525
00:18:38,835 --> 00:18:40,275
is what I heard about most because my
526
00:18:40,275 --> 00:18:42,579
tour guide, April Cridland, is a research fellow
527
00:18:42,579 --> 00:18:44,440
at CERN who's part of the alpha collaboration.
528
00:18:45,940 --> 00:18:47,380
What that means is whereas they used to
529
00:18:47,380 --> 00:18:50,259
take make maybe 20 or 30 atoms of
530
00:18:50,259 --> 00:18:52,200
anti hydrogen every four minutes,
531
00:18:52,579 --> 00:18:54,339
now they're making more than a hundred, which
532
00:18:54,339 --> 00:18:56,025
is a huge step because what used to
533
00:18:56,025 --> 00:18:56,525
take
534
00:18:57,065 --> 00:18:58,365
weeks now takes a day.
535
00:18:58,744 --> 00:19:00,744
So so she was saying that, actually, there's
536
00:19:00,744 --> 00:19:02,984
lots of alpha results due out later this
537
00:19:02,984 --> 00:19:03,725
year, including,
538
00:19:04,664 --> 00:19:05,164
sympathetically
539
00:19:05,545 --> 00:19:08,924
cooling antimatter with beryllium. So putting antimatter into
540
00:19:08,984 --> 00:19:10,205
contact with beryllium
541
00:19:10,950 --> 00:19:11,450
to
542
00:19:12,069 --> 00:19:14,569
maximize the number of anti hydrogen atoms trapped.
543
00:19:15,029 --> 00:19:16,970
So definitely stay tuned on that.
544
00:19:17,429 --> 00:19:19,029
Yeah. I I I mean, I think that's
545
00:19:19,029 --> 00:19:21,509
really exciting. And, you know, we we we
546
00:19:21,509 --> 00:19:24,015
shouldn't forget that, okay, we might see a
547
00:19:24,095 --> 00:19:26,734
a huge breakthrough beyond the standard model of
548
00:19:26,734 --> 00:19:27,714
particle physics
549
00:19:28,015 --> 00:19:30,015
from the LHC, you know, in the high
550
00:19:30,015 --> 00:19:30,515
luminosity
551
00:19:30,894 --> 00:19:33,214
upgrade. But, you know, it's possible that,
552
00:19:33,855 --> 00:19:36,815
the big, big discovery at CERN will come
553
00:19:36,815 --> 00:19:38,670
from one of those antimatter
554
00:19:39,049 --> 00:19:39,549
factories.
555
00:19:39,850 --> 00:19:42,410
So, lot there's lots going on there. Isn't
556
00:19:42,410 --> 00:19:42,910
there?
557
00:19:43,529 --> 00:19:45,690
Yeah. And and people are also, you know,
558
00:19:45,690 --> 00:19:47,930
starting to think about what the next machine
559
00:19:47,930 --> 00:19:49,529
might look like. That's kind of the final
560
00:19:49,529 --> 00:19:50,350
sort of component.
561
00:19:51,815 --> 00:19:53,734
And that's interesting to me because the time
562
00:19:53,734 --> 00:19:56,375
scales are so long on that Mhmm. That
563
00:19:56,375 --> 00:19:58,875
the older generation of scientists will probably never
564
00:19:59,414 --> 00:20:00,954
get to work on that next machine,
565
00:20:01,255 --> 00:20:03,035
although they may live to see it built
566
00:20:03,174 --> 00:20:04,154
after they've retired.
567
00:20:04,640 --> 00:20:06,720
And even today's early career researchers will be
568
00:20:06,720 --> 00:20:08,720
well into their careers, maybe even heading towards
569
00:20:08,720 --> 00:20:10,559
retirement on their own before it gets going.
570
00:20:10,559 --> 00:20:12,100
You have to have a long term perspective.
571
00:20:12,400 --> 00:20:14,400
And you mentioned this question of antimatter following
572
00:20:14,400 --> 00:20:16,000
up. This is this is kind of relevant
573
00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:18,164
for me because one of the very first
574
00:20:18,164 --> 00:20:20,404
stories I ever wrote as a science journalist,
575
00:20:20,404 --> 00:20:21,625
as a student, an undergraduate,
576
00:20:22,484 --> 00:20:23,944
was about a researcher
577
00:20:24,325 --> 00:20:26,565
at my university who was interested in finding
578
00:20:26,565 --> 00:20:28,424
out whether antimatter fell up.
579
00:20:28,724 --> 00:20:29,784
And so when,
580
00:20:30,929 --> 00:20:33,669
you know, the the antimatter experiments at CERN
581
00:20:34,210 --> 00:20:36,289
found started finding evidence that it does in
582
00:20:36,289 --> 00:20:38,450
fact fall down just like normal matter, I
583
00:20:38,450 --> 00:20:40,129
mean, it's kind of disappointment. Right? Because you
584
00:20:40,129 --> 00:20:42,529
wanna see some Oh, yeah. Unusual physics. But
585
00:20:42,529 --> 00:20:44,434
it was also kind of, you know, it
586
00:20:44,434 --> 00:20:46,755
felt very satisfying for me even as an
587
00:20:46,755 --> 00:20:48,994
observer of this to sort of have finally
588
00:20:48,994 --> 00:20:50,375
found the answer to a question
589
00:20:50,755 --> 00:20:52,134
I was asking researchers,
590
00:20:52,674 --> 00:20:54,694
you know, twenty years ago as a student.
591
00:20:55,234 --> 00:20:57,095
So, you know, this is definitely,
592
00:20:57,670 --> 00:20:59,430
you have to have a long term perspective,
593
00:20:59,430 --> 00:21:01,509
I think, to be a particle physicist, to
594
00:21:01,509 --> 00:21:03,269
think not just about the discoveries that are
595
00:21:03,269 --> 00:21:05,130
happening now, but the discoveries
596
00:21:05,750 --> 00:21:07,430
that are gonna be made in the future
597
00:21:07,430 --> 00:21:08,869
and what you need to do to get
598
00:21:08,869 --> 00:21:10,549
there to have that happen. And that's where
599
00:21:10,549 --> 00:21:12,410
I think everything kinda comes together.
600
00:21:13,244 --> 00:21:15,345
You you mentioned the sort of next generation.
601
00:21:15,404 --> 00:21:17,644
So the I suppose the LHC is going
602
00:21:17,644 --> 00:21:19,184
to run-in its high luminosity
603
00:21:20,045 --> 00:21:22,605
mode and, you know, gather lots more data.
604
00:21:22,605 --> 00:21:25,164
But at some point, it's it's just gonna
605
00:21:25,164 --> 00:21:27,664
run out of of of road, I suppose.
606
00:21:29,039 --> 00:21:30,559
When you when you spoke to people at
607
00:21:30,559 --> 00:21:33,200
CERN, did you have any feeling for what
608
00:21:33,200 --> 00:21:34,900
they thought the next generation
609
00:21:35,679 --> 00:21:37,919
collider would be? What I mean, are people
610
00:21:37,919 --> 00:21:39,779
very keen on this humongous
611
00:21:40,159 --> 00:21:42,159
collider that would sort of go under Lake
612
00:21:42,159 --> 00:21:42,659
Geneva,
613
00:21:43,974 --> 00:21:46,454
you know, this hue but much larger version
614
00:21:46,454 --> 00:21:47,275
of the LHC
615
00:21:47,654 --> 00:21:50,214
at CERN, I suppose, or, you know, maybe
616
00:21:50,214 --> 00:21:53,494
a linear collider somewhere else, or is it
617
00:21:53,575 --> 00:21:54,875
it is I mean,
618
00:21:55,255 --> 00:21:57,095
so I I suppose the community has to
619
00:21:57,095 --> 00:21:59,039
decide on what it wants to do, but
620
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:02,000
to to to people there, is it still
621
00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:04,400
really far in the future, or are they
622
00:22:04,400 --> 00:22:06,580
focusing on the LHC at the moment?
623
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:08,880
I think that, you know, it probably depends
624
00:22:08,880 --> 00:22:10,720
on what level you're talking about. You know,
625
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:11,220
the
626
00:22:12,174 --> 00:22:15,695
Fabiola Gianati and, actually, the the upcoming CERN
627
00:22:15,695 --> 00:22:18,134
director general director general designate Mark Thompson, who
628
00:22:18,134 --> 00:22:19,454
I think was on the podcast a couple
629
00:22:19,454 --> 00:22:21,695
weeks ago. Mhmm. They're very much thinking about
630
00:22:21,695 --> 00:22:23,535
the long term future as well as thinking
631
00:22:23,535 --> 00:22:25,954
about how to run the the experiments
632
00:22:26,335 --> 00:22:28,970
and the the collider in its current operational
633
00:22:29,750 --> 00:22:31,589
phase. I think I get the impression that
634
00:22:31,589 --> 00:22:33,910
the CERN is very much pushing for the
635
00:22:33,910 --> 00:22:36,470
establishment of the future circular collider, as it's
636
00:22:36,470 --> 00:22:38,630
called, this this big, even bigger version of
637
00:22:38,630 --> 00:22:39,289
the LHC.
638
00:22:40,765 --> 00:22:42,285
But I think that you're you're right. The
639
00:22:42,285 --> 00:22:44,704
community still has to sort of decide because
640
00:22:44,845 --> 00:22:45,904
it's clear that,
641
00:22:46,684 --> 00:22:48,384
you know, we're we're gonna get,
642
00:22:50,365 --> 00:22:51,825
you know, no more than
643
00:22:52,940 --> 00:22:54,880
one or two big
644
00:22:55,180 --> 00:22:57,599
ex additional big machines like this.
645
00:22:58,220 --> 00:23:01,180
The Chinese government is talking about building some
646
00:23:01,180 --> 00:23:03,579
sort of high energy facility there. It's a
647
00:23:03,579 --> 00:23:05,599
question about whether that will happen independently
648
00:23:05,980 --> 00:23:07,984
of what's going on in Europe or, you
649
00:23:07,984 --> 00:23:09,285
know, maybe The US.
650
00:23:10,144 --> 00:23:11,585
And these things just have to still still
651
00:23:11,585 --> 00:23:12,785
have to sort of shake out in the
652
00:23:12,785 --> 00:23:14,005
in the wash, really.
653
00:23:14,785 --> 00:23:16,945
Yeah. Well, it it'll be very interesting to
654
00:23:16,945 --> 00:23:17,845
see what happens.
655
00:23:18,144 --> 00:23:19,744
And, you know, for I mean, for our
656
00:23:19,744 --> 00:23:20,244
listeners,
657
00:23:21,590 --> 00:23:23,029
I mean, I think you'd agree with me,
658
00:23:23,029 --> 00:23:23,910
Margaret, that,
659
00:23:24,390 --> 00:23:26,950
CERN is a great day out. And I
660
00:23:26,950 --> 00:23:28,150
I don't think you have to be a
661
00:23:28,150 --> 00:23:29,289
member of the press
662
00:23:29,590 --> 00:23:31,990
to go. I think they do maybe do
663
00:23:31,990 --> 00:23:34,230
they have an open day every year? I
664
00:23:34,230 --> 00:23:36,470
know, certainly, one of our colleagues is gone
665
00:23:36,470 --> 00:23:38,785
as a sort of a normal citizen.
666
00:23:39,404 --> 00:23:41,404
Oh, yeah. You you can absolutely day. You
667
00:23:41,404 --> 00:23:43,565
can absolutely tour tour CERN as as an
668
00:23:43,565 --> 00:23:45,724
ordinary citizen. I believe it's actually the top
669
00:23:45,724 --> 00:23:48,845
ranked activity in Geneva on TripAdvisor or maybe
670
00:23:48,845 --> 00:23:51,329
the second after going to Lake Geneva itself.
671
00:23:51,809 --> 00:23:53,169
So, you know, you may not be able
672
00:23:53,169 --> 00:23:54,849
to go down and see the ATLAS detector
673
00:23:54,849 --> 00:23:56,450
like I did, but you can certainly go
674
00:23:56,450 --> 00:23:58,710
and, you know, have a look around the,
675
00:23:58,769 --> 00:24:00,769
you know, the control center and look around
676
00:24:00,769 --> 00:24:02,529
the the buildings on campus and as part
677
00:24:02,529 --> 00:24:04,369
of a a public tour group. And, yeah,
678
00:24:04,369 --> 00:24:06,335
it's it's whatever you get to see is
679
00:24:06,335 --> 00:24:09,134
absolutely impressive. Mhmm. There's also really, a really
680
00:24:09,134 --> 00:24:11,774
good museum there, the the CERN Gateway. Mhmm.
681
00:24:11,774 --> 00:24:13,934
That's, I think that's probably, like, number four
682
00:24:13,934 --> 00:24:15,134
on the list of things to do in
683
00:24:15,294 --> 00:24:17,534
if you go to visit visit Geneva. So
684
00:24:17,534 --> 00:24:19,154
that's also a a great attraction.
685
00:24:19,669 --> 00:24:21,769
Great. Well, thanks for the update, Margaret.
686
00:24:22,309 --> 00:24:24,250
You're welcome, Hamish. Nice to talk to you.
687
00:24:32,115 --> 00:24:34,755
That was Margaret Harris, and there'll be much
688
00:24:34,755 --> 00:24:38,295
more about CERN from Margaret in physics world,
689
00:24:38,434 --> 00:24:39,734
so stay tuned.
690
00:24:40,595 --> 00:24:43,634
Twenty twenty five is the international year of
691
00:24:43,634 --> 00:24:45,414
quantum science and technology,
692
00:24:46,170 --> 00:24:46,910
and celebrations
693
00:24:47,450 --> 00:24:48,590
are well underway
694
00:24:49,210 --> 00:24:50,830
here at Physics World.
695
00:24:51,450 --> 00:24:53,630
Our latest contribution to the festivities
696
00:24:53,930 --> 00:24:57,309
is a fun quiz about all things quantum,
697
00:24:57,850 --> 00:25:01,230
and here are three of my favorite questions.
698
00:25:02,534 --> 00:25:03,434
Which celebrity
699
00:25:03,815 --> 00:25:05,674
was spotted in the audience
700
00:25:06,054 --> 00:25:09,835
at a meeting about quantum computers and music
701
00:25:10,214 --> 00:25:12,585
in London in December
702
00:25:12,585 --> 00:25:13,595
2022?
703
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:15,820
Was it Peter Andre,
704
00:25:16,360 --> 00:25:17,340
Peter Capaldi,
705
00:25:17,960 --> 00:25:18,779
Peter Gabriel,
706
00:25:19,320 --> 00:25:20,779
or Peter Schmeichel?
707
00:25:21,320 --> 00:25:24,299
So which one of those Peters is interested
708
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:26,380
in quantum music?
709
00:25:28,335 --> 00:25:31,474
The next question is which of the following
710
00:25:31,615 --> 00:25:34,115
versions of the quantum hall effect
711
00:25:34,494 --> 00:25:36,035
has not been observed
712
00:25:36,494 --> 00:25:38,035
so far in the lab?
713
00:25:38,815 --> 00:25:41,634
Is it the fractional quantum hall effect,
714
00:25:42,130 --> 00:25:43,190
the anomalous
715
00:25:43,569 --> 00:25:45,509
fractional quantum hall effect,
716
00:25:45,970 --> 00:25:46,869
the anyonic
717
00:25:47,490 --> 00:25:49,429
fractional quantum hall effect,
718
00:25:49,730 --> 00:25:51,190
or the excitonic
719
00:25:51,890 --> 00:25:53,990
fractional quantum hall effect?
720
00:25:54,369 --> 00:25:55,990
So which of those effects
721
00:25:56,565 --> 00:25:59,065
hasn't been observed in the lab?
722
00:25:59,764 --> 00:26:00,585
And finally,
723
00:26:01,044 --> 00:26:02,105
what destroyed
724
00:26:02,484 --> 00:26:03,224
the Helgoland
725
00:26:04,085 --> 00:26:04,585
guesthouse
726
00:26:05,125 --> 00:26:06,664
where Werner Heisenberg
727
00:26:06,964 --> 00:26:09,704
stayed in 1925
728
00:26:10,005 --> 00:26:10,825
while developing
729
00:26:11,460 --> 00:26:12,200
quantum mechanics.
730
00:26:12,980 --> 00:26:14,440
Was it a bomb,
731
00:26:14,900 --> 00:26:17,480
a gas leak, a rat infestation,
732
00:26:18,259 --> 00:26:19,480
or a storm?
733
00:26:20,259 --> 00:26:23,299
The quiz has 15 more questions to test
734
00:26:23,299 --> 00:26:24,919
your quantum knowledge,
735
00:26:25,335 --> 00:26:27,255
and you can find it on the Physics
736
00:26:27,255 --> 00:26:28,154
World website.
737
00:26:28,934 --> 00:26:30,234
Just look for the headline,
738
00:26:30,694 --> 00:26:34,474
test your quantum knowledge in this fun quiz.
739
00:26:36,375 --> 00:26:39,994
The commercial quantum technology sector is burgeoning,
740
00:26:40,509 --> 00:26:43,069
and I'm sure that some podcast listeners are
741
00:26:43,069 --> 00:26:44,450
keen on pursuing
742
00:26:44,829 --> 00:26:45,890
quantum careers.
743
00:26:46,589 --> 00:26:48,450
So if you'd like some inspiration
744
00:26:48,990 --> 00:26:50,849
and a few tips for success,
745
00:26:51,390 --> 00:26:53,809
check out our interview with Michelle
746
00:26:54,109 --> 00:26:54,609
Lawley,
747
00:26:55,015 --> 00:26:56,234
who is an advanced
748
00:26:56,535 --> 00:26:57,515
laser scientist
749
00:26:57,894 --> 00:26:58,794
at Quantinium.
750
00:26:59,894 --> 00:27:02,075
There, she supports the design,
751
00:27:02,454 --> 00:27:02,954
development,
752
00:27:03,335 --> 00:27:04,075
and construction
753
00:27:04,615 --> 00:27:05,515
of complex
754
00:27:05,894 --> 00:27:06,954
optical systems
755
00:27:07,359 --> 00:27:10,740
that will serve as the foundations of quantum
756
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:11,380
computers.
757
00:27:12,319 --> 00:27:14,819
After studying finance at university,
758
00:27:15,440 --> 00:27:18,419
Michelle worked for several years as an investment
759
00:27:18,720 --> 00:27:19,220
banker.
760
00:27:19,964 --> 00:27:23,744
But after reading a scientific paper about quantum
761
00:27:23,964 --> 00:27:24,464
teleportation,
762
00:27:25,484 --> 00:27:28,224
she packed that in to become a physicist,
763
00:27:29,005 --> 00:27:30,384
gaining a PhD
764
00:27:30,845 --> 00:27:32,464
in quantum optics.
765
00:27:33,190 --> 00:27:36,170
You can read all about her career shift
766
00:27:36,309 --> 00:27:39,529
in the article From Banking to Michelle
767
00:27:41,269 --> 00:27:41,769
Lawley's
768
00:27:42,070 --> 00:27:43,369
Unique Journey.
769
00:27:43,910 --> 00:27:46,144
And you can find that on the Physics
770
00:27:46,285 --> 00:27:47,345
World website.
771
00:27:48,285 --> 00:27:50,125
I'm afraid that's all the time we have
772
00:27:50,125 --> 00:27:51,424
for this week's podcast.
773
00:27:51,805 --> 00:27:54,924
Thanks to Margaret Harris for speaking to me
774
00:27:54,924 --> 00:27:57,904
today, and a special thanks to our producer,
775
00:27:58,285 --> 00:27:59,265
Fred Isles.
776
00:27:59,940 --> 00:28:02,419
We'll be back again next week. See you
777
00:28:02,419 --> 00:28:02,919
then.
