Large Hadron Collider sets new record, smashes protons head on

“This event is largely symbolic because nobody doubted that the collisions would take place,” Igor Golutvin, head of research at the Science Methods Section of the Particle Physics Laboratory at the Dubna-based Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) near Moscow, told journalists. Photo: Igor Golutvin, head of the seminar “Large Hadron Collider Physics,” after registering the first 3.5 teraelectron volt proton collision.

The LHC project was launched in the late 1990s. The collider was activated in September 2008 in an impressive setting. On September 10, 2008, the proton beams were successfully circulated in the main ring of the LHC for the first time, but operations were halted nine days later due to a serious fault in one of the two superconducting bending magnets.

It took CERN scientists a year to enhance the reliability of electric connections between the magnets’ power supply system and to install the LHC’s quench protection system (QPS) shielding superconducting magnets from similar accidents. The LHC was reactivated on November 20, 2009. In 2012, the LHC will be switched off and adjustments will be made in order for it to attain full design capacity, or 14 teraelectron volts. This is seven times higher than the rated power of The Tevatron, a circular particle accelerator at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois, in the United States.

The involvement of Russian scientists in unique projects, including the ambitious LHC project, is no less prestigious than the number of Olympic medals won by Russian athletes, said Viktor Matveyev, Academic Secretary of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Physical Sciences Department. Matveyev told this to journalists on Tuesday at a Dubna seminar on initial LHC proton beam collisions. Photo: Viktor Matveyev, Academic Secretary of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Physical Sciences Department.

Matveyev said Russia became involved in the LHC project in 1996, when an agreement between the Russian government and CERN was signed. At that time, Russia pledged to allocate $6 billion annually for the project over the next ten years. Matveyev stressed that, as compared to other participants, Russia had an equal status in the project. Although it was not a CERN member, Russia had an absolutely equal status with regard to other participants. Photo: Elements of superconducting nuclei and heavy-ions accelerator at the High Energy laboratory of the Dubna-based Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR).

“Russia is an equal partner, accounting for 7% of the LHC project. 700 physicists and engineers are involved in it,” Matveyev said. Photo: The acceleration room at the High Energy Laboratory of the Dubna-based Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR).

Matveyev said virtually all Russian physics institutes, including Russian Academy of Sciences institutes, institutes affiliated with Rosatom Nuclear Energy State Corporation, major national universities, and Moscow State University, were involved in the LHC project. Numerous Russian enterprises manufactured equipment for the LHC. Notably, 80,000 lead tungstate crystals were manufactured in Bogoroditsk in the Tula Region. Photo: Elements of the superconducting nuclei and heavy ions accelerator at the High Energy Laboratory of the Dubna-based Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR).