Fears about CERN’s Large Hadron Collider are “pure fiction”

by William Atkins

Saturday, 06 September 2008

Page 2 of 3 The scientists state, “The LHC reproduces in the laboratory, under controlled conditions, collisions at centre-of-mass energies, less than those reached in the atmosphere by some of the cosmic rays that have been bombarding the Earth for billions of years. We recall the rates for the collisions of cosmic rays with the Earth, Sun, neutron stars, white dwarfs and other astronomical bodies at energies higher than the LHC. The stability of astronomical bodies indicates that such collisions cannot be dangerous.” Further, “Specifically, we study the possible production at the LHC of hypothetical objects such as vacuum bubbles, magnetic monopoles, microscopic black holes and strangelets, and find no associated risks. Any microscopic black holes produced at the LHC are expected to decay by Hawking radiation before they reach the detector walls. If some microscopic black holes were stable, those produced by cosmic rays would be stopped inside the Earth or other astronomical bodies.” And, “The stability of astronomical bodies strongly constrains the possible rate of accretion by any such microscopic black holes, so that they present no conceivable danger. In the case of strangelets, the good agreement of measurements of particle production at RHIC with simple thermodynamic models severely constrains the production of strangelets in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC, which also present no danger.” According to the September 5, 2008 press release by CERN, its director general, Robert Aymar, states, “The LHC will enable us to study in detail what nature is doing all around us. The LHC is safe, and any suggestion that it might present a risk is pure fiction.” [CERN: “CERN reiterates safety of LHC on eve of first beam”] CERN’s chief scientific officer, Jos Engelen, adds, “The LHC safety review has shown that the LHC is perfectly safe. It points out that Nature has already conducted the equivalent of about a hundred thousand LHC experimental programmes on Earth – and the planet still exists.” Page three continues to state the wide spread number of scientists around the world who have taken part in this safety investigation. << First page <   1 2 3 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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