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http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20081205/twl-hadron-collider-repairs-to-cost-30m-41f21e0.html
Hadron Collider repairs to cost £30m
Repairs to the Large Hadron Collider, built to simulate a "Big Bang", could cost around £30 million, scientists have said.
The massive particle collider is the biggest and most complex machine ever made and designed to recreate conditions just after the universe was created 13.7 billion years ago.
It sends beams of sub-atomic particles to smash into each other at nearly the speed of light. Physicists believe the results of those explosions could unlock more secrets of science.
However, nine days after it began firing beams of proton particles around its 17 mile underground tunnel, scientists were forced to shut it down when an electrical fault caused a helium leak.
James Gillies, spokesman for the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (Cern), said the leak caused "quite considerable mechanical damage to the accelerator".
He said repairing it will require 59 of the 1,600 magnets in the collider's tunnel, buried under the Swiss-French border near Geneva, to be removed and then re-installed.
Some 28 have already come out, and all the magnets should be back in place by the end of March, he said, with the machine likely to be powered up again for tests by June.
The collider is supported by Cern's 20 European member states and other nations including the US and Russia. But Mr Gillies said: "We will not be going to our member states asking for more money, we will deal with it within the current Cern budget."
Hadron Collider repairs to cost £30m
Repairs to the Large Hadron Collider, built to simulate a "Big Bang", could cost around £30 million, scientists have said.
The massive particle collider is the biggest and most complex machine ever made and designed to recreate conditions just after the universe was created 13.7 billion years ago.
It sends beams of sub-atomic particles to smash into each other at nearly the speed of light. Physicists believe the results of those explosions could unlock more secrets of science.
However, nine days after it began firing beams of proton particles around its 17 mile underground tunnel, scientists were forced to shut it down when an electrical fault caused a helium leak.
James Gillies, spokesman for the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (Cern), said the leak caused "quite considerable mechanical damage to the accelerator".
He said repairing it will require 59 of the 1,600 magnets in the collider's tunnel, buried under the Swiss-French border near Geneva, to be removed and then re-installed.
Some 28 have already come out, and all the magnets should be back in place by the end of March, he said, with the machine likely to be powered up again for tests by June.
The collider is supported by Cern's 20 European member states and other nations including the US and Russia. But Mr Gillies said: "We will not be going to our member states asking for more money, we will deal with it within the current Cern budget."
