Oops! Sorry. I mean "most" powerful. Particle accelerator, that is. On November 30, 2009, it accelerated two beams of protons moving in opposite directions each to an energy of 1.18 TeV – that’s trillion electron volts, well above the previous record of 0.98 TeV. When it’s all ready to go, the LHC will get those beams up to 7 TeV, high enough — we hope — to start doing some serious science, and giving investigators a chance to see how the Universe ticks.
For those who are curious, an energy of 1.18 TeV is about 1.9 ergs, which seems like a ridiculously small energy. An erg is very roughly the amount of kinetic energy a falling raindrop has… but a raindrop has a lot of protons in it. In the case of the LHC, each proton in the beams will have that much energy!
Putting it another way, the speed of the protons moving in the beams when they are juiced up to 7 TeV is 99.999999% of the speed of light. They could travel to the Moon in just over one second. It took the Apollo astronauts more than three days to cover the same distance. The total energy in the beams, as my friend Brian Cox points out, is equivalent to a battleship moving at several miles per hour.
And that’s just before the protons smash together. The collisions will be epic.
So this is yet another milestone on the way to real and cutting-edge science, which is slated to begin in early 2010. Stay tuned!
December 1st, 2009 at 7:41 am
ergs? Next, Phil will express the beam’s power density in horespower per acre-foot.
December 1st, 2009 at 7:45 am
doomed were all doomed i tell ya
December 1st, 2009 at 7:57 am
rob made me laugh:).
December 1st, 2009 at 8:01 am
Now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational LHC!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:02 am
[...] (more…) Comments (0) [...]
December 1st, 2009 at 8:04 am
Apparently, theoretical physicists still use cgs units (thus “erg” as the unit of energy). 1 erg = 1/10,000,000 joules (the SI unit for energy). (One wonders if they still use “barn” as a unit of area.)
December 1st, 2009 at 8:06 am
“They could travel to the Moon in just over one second.”
True, but much lower energy beams which travel at only 0.99c will still reach the moon in nearly the same time.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:10 am
I for one welcome our new proton-bashing overlords.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:15 am
Now witness the power of this fully armed and operational particle accelerator!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:18 am
I hope there is no antimatter hanging around that proton’s path! Kaboom!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:18 am
Hopefully the collisions will not just be epic , but will be an epoch event!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:25 am
Regarding the use of the word “power” in the context of the LHC, Cosmic Variance has something fundamental to say. And the plan seems to be to do the first ‘serious science’ already at 3.5 TeV per beam which should be reachable early next year.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:30 am
@ Idlemind (4) -
Looks like.
http[colon-slash-slash]en[dot]wikipedia[dot]org/wiki/Barn_(unit)
December 1st, 2009 at 8:30 am
@ idlemind:
In fact, it depends on the field of physics which units you use. Astronomers still use cgs. Barn is mainly used by particle physicists.
I wonder, if anyone at all uses SI. This was meant to unify all unit systems (haha). But this attempt failed, as I see it. As usual. Terrible.
————————————————————
[deep voice on] You can’t hide forever, Higgs! [deep voice off]
December 1st, 2009 at 8:34 am
And as we all know, if a battleship ever moved at several miles per hour, the universe would implode.
Or something.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:35 am
Wonder what the electric bill on that thing is.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:36 am
In JPL’s early days (one side or the other of the switch from Army Ordnance Corps to NASA), a formal report was written in the Furlong-Stone-Fortnight system. The speed of light is 1.8026175 × 10^12 furlongs per fortnight (trusting Google) which is reasonable–but the stone sort of makes the numbers non-intuitive. (I weigh around 17 3/4 stone–much nicer than my weight in either kg or lbs [248].)
The author was tired of the various measurement systems he had to deal with (and important enough to get away with it). I have no idea whether the report is still in the files. (Mother was using her PhD at JPL–and was not the report author.)
As to the real part of the story (the units have captured the comments): wow!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:42 am
Hopefully, they will be a bit more “cutting edge scientific” than those clowns at Hadley CRU.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:46 am
All hail the All Powerful LHC!!!
We bow before you, oh Master! Command Us!
December 1st, 2009 at 8:48 am
I love driving in Canada because I can drive 110kph versus 68mph. I can drive 966 kilometers in one day versus 600 miles. Its all relative.
December 1st, 2009 at 8:54 am
I forget the math (many year removed from my Quantum Physics class), but what would be the mass of the proton at that speed?
December 1st, 2009 at 9:02 am
So if it all works out we will be able to hear what there was before the big bang. Something like “uh ooh…”
December 1st, 2009 at 9:04 am
Phil, Thanks for relating the energies and speeds to something that I can understand. Personally, I have trouble wrapping my mind aroung TeVs and ergs.
December 1st, 2009 at 9:06 am
But, what about all of the black holes? You forgot to mention the black holes, Phil. Now, those are really going to be epic! I can hardly wait!
December 1st, 2009 at 9:07 am
1.9 ergs/proton is equivalent to a gas temp of over 9,000,000,000,000,000 K. 9 PK.
LHC is HOT! (Go write that on your bathroom wall.)
December 1st, 2009 at 9:12 am
I wonder if it goes to 11.
December 1st, 2009 at 9:26 am
How many gigawatts is this? Are we in danger of sending the proton back to the future?
December 1st, 2009 at 9:29 am
#22, Beasjt:
I thought the quote was “Hold my beer and watch this!”
December 1st, 2009 at 9:38 am
@JG- It does go to 11. It goes 1 louder than all the others.
December 1st, 2009 at 9:41 am
Reverend J @22: With v/c = 0.99999999, gamma is 7071, so the the proton’s mass as measured in our frame is 7071 times its rest mass.
As Chris @7 noted, rest-frame travel times don’t really separate 0.99c from 0.99999999c. I find subjective time is a helpful metric here. At 0.99c, gamma is 7.08, and a trip to Alpha Centauri takes around 7.5 subjective months. At a gamma of 7071, the trip takes only six hours, and you could cross the galaxy in 14 years.
December 1st, 2009 at 9:42 am
insert joke about hitting the broadside of a barn…
December 1st, 2009 at 10:03 am
So exactly how powerful is the beam? Would it go thru something like steel?
December 1st, 2009 at 10:27 am
So… is the Earth still here?
December 1st, 2009 at 10:48 am
@rob
Insert joke (paradox) about proton beam traveling through barn while barn doors are simultaneously closed.
December 1st, 2009 at 10:52 am
Status update on the Earth since this latest LHC test:
http://hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com/
December 1st, 2009 at 10:55 am
32. Ray Says: “So exactly how powerful is the beam? Would it go thru something like steel?”
With or without leaving a hole?
Suddenly I have visions of Exeter’s neutrino beam in Meacham’s lab.
- Jack
December 1st, 2009 at 11:10 am
Jack powerful enough to leave indeed a hole, black.
December 1st, 2009 at 11:18 am
My favorite FSF unit is the barn megaparsec, a unit of volume approximately equal to 5/8 of a teaspoon, but unable to contain any actual normal matter due to its elongated shape.
December 1st, 2009 at 11:49 am
But battleships move in knots. Miles per hour. Sheesh. When’s the last time you saw one trolling around the countryside?
December 1st, 2009 at 11:55 am
The TeVatron is still cooler. *We* have antimatter!
December 1st, 2009 at 11:56 am
What are the chances of a proton at those energies traveling to the future and knocking out the saboteur protons that were planning to travel back and destroy the LHC?
December 1st, 2009 at 11:56 am
Time?
December 1st, 2009 at 12:05 pm
When will the proton beams collide??????
December 1st, 2009 at 12:23 pm
So, um… a battleship can make black holes?
Anyway, if they cross the streams won’t it cause total protonic reversal? That’s bad!
December 1st, 2009 at 12:48 pm
@Yojimbo
Sort of, yup… Philadelphia Experiment and that sort of thing.
December 1st, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Actually, I did a little math on what the maximum potential energy of the LHC would be like at 7 TeV per beam.
It’s the equivalent of two ants being flicked at each other at just under two miles an hour. The same 7 TeVs that are supposed to destroy the planet couldn’t even hurt a fly. Literally.
December 1st, 2009 at 1:40 pm
The “Oh- My- God” particle had an energy of 3.2±0.9×10^20 electron volts for comparison, about the same as a dropped brick.
December 1st, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Hmmm….I think we need to come up with some new units of energy.
We already have the erg. I nominate the ARGH to represent the energy that you expend in slapping your forehead when the proton beams just miss colliding with each other.
Any others?
December 1st, 2009 at 1:45 pm
@ tiggerbone
Oh, come on. Antimatter is so outdated, so uncool. The tunnel of the LHC used to house the LEP before. The Large Electron Positron Collider. So, Cern is already beyond antimatter. Tevatron is so lame.
In order someone doesn’t get it: This is meant as a joke! So, please start to giggle!
December 1st, 2009 at 1:59 pm
“Don’t let the proton streams cross!”
December 1st, 2009 at 2:00 pm
I say that anytime I’m peeing beside my two sons.
December 1st, 2009 at 2:06 pm
@Reverend J,
Is it Quantum Physics or relativity? I believe for relativity, the equation is:
M1 = M2 / SquareRoot(1 – (V/C)^2)
Where M1 is the mass from our frame of reference and M2 is the mass from the proton’s. So if the proton is going at 99.999999% of C, then it would be:
M1 = M2 / SquareRoot(1 – (0.99999999)^2)
or about 50,000,000 times M2 which is (…quick stop by Google…) 8.3631079 × 10^-20 kilograms.
December 1st, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Sure, the astronauts would get the the Moon a lot faster if they went 99.999999% the speed of light, but stopping in time would be a pain. Literally. (Well, maybe not. It’d probably be over before they even realized what happened.)
December 1st, 2009 at 2:14 pm
@DrFlimmer
You’re just jealous.
December 1st, 2009 at 4:18 pm
[...] Spiegel, AP, BBC, Scientific American, Telegraph, Physics World, LiveScience und Cosmic Diary und Bad Astronomy zum Rekord, Cosmic Variance zum Unterschied Energie & Leistung und das erste Paper, auch hier [...]
December 1st, 2009 at 8:18 pm
Here is a live webcam at CERN that you can monitor!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JYkMhQ9gf8
December 1st, 2009 at 9:28 pm
The mass of the proton is invariant; it’s the same no matter how fast it’s moving. The whole relativistic relationship, which incorporates velocity, is E2 = p2c2 + m2c4.
December 1st, 2009 at 11:08 pm
[...] Phil Plait [...]
December 2nd, 2009 at 4:07 am
This LHC is even more dangerous than smoking!
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:29 am
And remember that there are two beams travelling in opposite direction. The relative speed of two protons colliding is almost twice the speed of light. Nice firecracker!
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:42 am
@25. Bill Nettles Says
LHC is HOT! (Go write that on your bathroom wall.)
No fear – she might see it!
@ 58. sascha/hdrs Says:
This LHC is even more dangerous than smoking!
Well that may depend on *what* it is you’re smoking!
@ 39. eyesoars Says:
But battleships move in knots. Miles per hour. Sheesh. When’s the last time you saw one trolling around the countryside?
Last Wednesday.
But then see above about smoking!
Actually there is the space-battleship Yamato / Argo from StarBlazers although it flew in space and generally is above land …
See : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SpaceBattleshipYamato.jpg
& http://www.starblazers.com/home.php
Actually from the look of one of the pictures there the Yamato /Argo is armed with something like the LHC in its bow.
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:24 am
> I hope there is no antimatter hanging around that proton’s path! Kaboom!
Wouldn’t the resulting quanta of energy simply produce another particle? Like maybe another proton with an equivalent energy? (Or maybe they’d get lucky and get some other more exotic particle.) Wasn’t that the point? It would be, like, a bonus if someone got an image of that. (Do they still USE bubble chambers for that?)
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:45 am
John Baxter: Thanks! Way back when in my AP Physics class we had a running joke about c in furlongs/fortnight, because the teacher liked to give problems in mixed units. I always wondered where that came from. Of course, now I wonder how a bunch of high school geeks heard about it in the late 70s.
Re astronauts traveling to the moon at 99.999999% of c (Tau-7071), they’d better be able to stop! If I did the math right, a 60kg astronaut (sans spacecraft and space suit) hitting the moon at that speed has a KE of 3.8E+22 J, or around 9 million megatons. Goodbye moon, and not so good for the earth, either!
Ain’t relativity cool!
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:43 pm
“60. Michael Says:
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:29 am
And remember that there are two beams travelling in opposite direction. The relative speed of two protons colliding is almost twice the speed of light. Nice firecracker!”
It can’t be. The speed of one object relative to any other can never exceed the speed of light.
The relative speed of the two protons is closer to the speed of light than the speed of one of the protons relative to, say, Geneva but it’s still less than c.
December 21st, 2009 at 1:05 pm
“64. Blizno Says:
It can’t be. The speed of one object relative to any other can never exceed the speed of light.
The relative speed of the two protons is closer to the speed of light than the speed of one of the protons relative to, say, Geneva but it’s still less than c.”
Oh Metaphysical/Astrophysical Guru: care to explain why the speed of light cannot be exceeded?
Clearly it can as witnessed in view of a black hole… or maybe there is more to the picture than current physics can explain..