Mini Big Bangs in ALICE and the CERN LHC

Location
Large Lecture Theatre - Poynting Building Second floor (R 13 on the campus map)
Dates
Tuesday 14 March 2017 (19:30-20:30)
ALICE

The 27km Large Hadron Collider (LHC), situated 150 metres under the Swiss-French boarder at CERN near Geneva, is the World's most powerful particle accelerator.

In the LHC, protons (hydrogen nuclei) are smashed together at 0.999999991 times the speed of light recreating, for a tiny instant, the violent particle collisions which would have existed less than a billionth of a second after the Big Bang. For about four weeks a year, lead nuclei are accelerated and collided in the LHC producing the highest temperatures and densities ever made in an experiment and recreating the exotic primordial soup which existed at the birth of our Universe.

David Evans, Professor in High Energy Physics, will explain the physics behind the LHC and, in particular, the ALICE Experiment. His talk will include some audience participation and demonstrations with liquid nitrogen and is aimed at all age groups.