How come don’t particle accelerators just blow up?

Question

When we try to make new elements and launch atoms at one another they don’t blow up, but when you do that in a nuclear device it ruin’s cities

In: 0

Answer 1

A nuclear device contains a lot of fissile material. A single atom splitting doesn’t release a lot of energy. However, when there are other unstable atoms nearby, they get hit by the “debris” from the splitting atom, splitting them as well, resulting in a chain reaction that splits trillions of atoms, resulting in a lot of energy being released.