Physics students explore CERN

On Tuesday 3rd February, 14 physics students, Mr. Murphy and Dr Suharan travelled to Switzerland to visit CERN and learn about the science and 70 years of history behind the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). This is the biggest underground particle accelerator in the world, which smashes large particles (hadrons) together and is designed to recreate the conditions in the universe a few seconds after the Big Bang. We also had the chance to visit Geneva, one of the most beautiful cities in the world. CERN is also famous because the World Wide Web was invented here and given away to the world for free! This is the protocol and technology that allows us all to use the internet in the way that we have all come to rely on today.

They spent time walking around Lake Geneva, which contains the world famous Jet d’Eau. This is one of the world’s tallest fountains, shooting 500 litres of water per second to a height of 150 metres into the air at speeds of 200 km/h. Students also saw various nighttime tourist attractions such as the Flower Clock and then spent the following day at all the CERN exhibitions.

The group were fortunate to visit the CERN control centre and the plant which makes all the superconducting magnets used in the accelerator. CERN is still at the forefront of many ground-breaking technologies that may be used by us in the future. Lastly, the students visited a highly recommended bowling alley with infinite pizza and soda – both students and teachers had a great time and would recommend it to anyone.

We would like to thank Mrs. Holden and Ms. Gibson for making this trip possible.