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Scientists release plans for an even bigger atom smasher to address the mysteries of physics

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Scientists release plans for an even bigger atom smasher to address the mysteries of physics
News

News

Scientists release plans for an even bigger atom smasher to address the mysteries of physics

2025-04-01 22:58 Last Updated At:23:00

GENEVA (AP) — Top minds at the world's largest atom smasher have released a blueprint for a much bigger successor that could vastly improve research into the remaining enigmas of physics.

The plans for the Future Circular Collider — a nearly 91-kilometer (56.5-mile) loop along the French-Swiss border and below Lake Geneva — published late Monday put the finishing details on a project roughly a decade in the making at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.

The FCC would carry out high-precision experiments in the mid-2040s to study “known physics” in greater detail, then enter a second phase — planned for 2070 — that would conduct high-energy collisions of protons and heavy ions that would “open the door to the unknown,” said Giorgio Chiarelli, a research director at Italy’s National Institute of Nuclear Physics.

“History of physics tells that when there is more data, the human ingenuity is able to extract more information than originally expected,” Chiarelli, who was not involved in the plans, said in an e-mail.

For roughly a decade, top minds at CERN have been making plans for a successor to the Large Hadron Collider, a network of magnets that accelerate particles through a 27-kilometer (17-mile) underground tunnel and slam them together at velocities approaching the speed of light.

The blueprint lays out the proposed path, environmental impact, scientific ambitions and project cost. Independent experts will take a look before CERN's two dozen member countries — all European except for Israel — decide in 2028 whether to go forward, starting in the mid-2040s at a cost of some 14 billion Swiss francs (about $16 billion).

CERN officials tout the promise of scientific discoveries that could drive innovation in fields like cryogenics, superconducting magnets and vacuum technologies that could benefit humankind.

Outside experts point to the promise of learning more about the Higgs boson, the elusive particle that has been controversially dubbed “the God particle,” which helped explain how matter formed after the Big Bang.

Work at the Large Hadron Collider confirmed in 2013 the existence of the Higgs boson, the central piece in a puzzle known as the standard model that helps explains some fundamental forces in the universe.

CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti said the future collider "could become the most extraordinary instrument ever built by humanity to study the constituents and the laws of nature at the most fundamental levels in two ways,” by improving study of the Higgs boson and paving the way to “explore the energy frontier,” and by looking for new physics that explain the structure and evolution of the universe.

One unknown is whether the Trump administration, which has been cutting foreign aid and spending in academia and research, will continue to support CERN a year after the Biden administration pledged U.S. support for the study and collaboration on the FCC's construction and “physics exploitation” if it's approved.

The United States is home to 2,000 users of CERN, making them the single largest national contingent among the 17,000 people working there, including outside experts abroad and staff on site, Gianotti said.

While an observer state and not a member, the U.S. doesn't pay into the CERN regular budget but has contributed to specific projects. Most of the CERN regular budget comes from Europe.

Costas Fountas, the CERN Council president, said he had spoken with some U.S. National Science Foundation and Department of Energy staff who relayed the message that so far “they're 'under the radar of the cuts of the Trump administration'. That’s their words.”

CERN scientists, engineers and partners behind the plans considered at least 100 scenarios for the new collider before coming up with the proposed 91-kilometer circumference at an average depth of 200 meters (656 feet). The tunnel would be about 5 meters (16 feet) in diameter, CERN said.

Mike Lamont, director for accelerators and technology, center left, and Fabiola Gianotti, center right, director general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), speak with members of the U.S. House of Representatives in the Large Magnet Facility during a visit to CERN facilities in Meyrin, near Geneva, Switzerland, Friday, March 21, 2025. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

Mike Lamont, director for accelerators and technology, center left, and Fabiola Gianotti, center right, director general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), speak with members of the U.S. House of Representatives in the Large Magnet Facility during a visit to CERN facilities in Meyrin, near Geneva, Switzerland, Friday, March 21, 2025. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

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PSG defender Achraf Hakimi named top African player in Ligue 1

2025-05-12 23:38 Last Updated At:23:41

PARIS (AP) — Paris Saint-Germain defender Achraf Hakimi has been voted the top African player in Ligue 1 after helping his club win the title and reach the Champions League final.

The 26-year-old Moroccan won the the Marc-Vivien Foe Award ahead of Nice forward Evann Guessand, from Ivory Coast, and Strasbourg midfielder Habib Diarra, from Senegal.

The prize is named after Foe, the popular Cameroon player and two-time African champion who collapsed and died on a field in France in 2003 while playing for his country.

Hakimi, regarded as one of the best right backs in the world, scored as Arsenal was beaten 2-1 last week in their Champions League semifinal second leg.

He is the second defender to win the award after Congolese player Chancel Mbemba in 2023. He's also the fourth Moroccan, following Marouane Chamakh in 2009, Younès Belhanda in 2012 and Sofiane Boufal in 2016.

PSG is hoping for its first-ever treble. In addition to the Champions League final against Inter Milan on May 31, it faces Reims the week before in the French Cup final.

Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang won the honor in 2024.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

PSG's Achraf Hakimi celebrates after scoring his sides second goal during the Champions League semifinal, second leg soccer match between Paris Saint-Germain and Arsenal at the Parc des Princes in Paris, Wednesday, May 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

PSG's Achraf Hakimi celebrates after scoring his sides second goal during the Champions League semifinal, second leg soccer match between Paris Saint-Germain and Arsenal at the Parc des Princes in Paris, Wednesday, May 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

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