What is particle acceleration and how does it work?

Question

And how do people make one at home?

In: 1

Answer 1

A particle accelerator takes two particles, like protons, and magnetically accelerates . Using a massive loop of magnetic coils the particle is accelerated as close to the speed of light as we can get. Then they are sent smashing into each other at a precise point. That point is filled with sensitive instruments to record everything that happens during the collision. In the literal moments after the collision we can map the subatomic particles that explode out as well as the energy waves.

There’s a reason why the Large Hadron Collider took over 4.5 billion US dollars to build and costs 1 billion US dollars a year to operate. The electric bill alone for the LHC is around 23.5 millions US dollars a year.