Particle Pings: Sounds Of The Large Hadron Collider

[Ian David]

Particle Pings: Sounds Of The Large Hadron Collider

Deep beneath the border of France and Switzerland, the world's most massive physics machine is sending subatomic particles smashing into each other at speeds nearing the speed of light. Physicists working with the 17-mile-long Large Hadron Collider hope it will help solve some of the universe's mysteries.

But first, researchers must overcome two very mundane hurdles: how to handle all of the data the LHC generates, and how to get non-scientists to care.

One physicist has a novel way to solve both problems: sound.

"I have some musician friends that I was talking to about physics, which I do a lot, if people will let me, and I was doing impersonations of particles — as you do — or maybe not," Lily Asquith says with a laugh. She is a physicist who until recently worked with the LHC at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research


This is what researchers at the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider expect data from a Higgs boson to look like. The Higgs boson is the subatomic particle that scientists say gives everything in the universe mass.

More:
http://www.npr.org/2011/01/02/132415764/particle-pings-sounds-of-the-large-hadron-collider

Hat-tip to: http://twitter.com/WebWhy/status/21911728535117825

I've seen that somewhere before...