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by Chris Woodford . Last updated: January 6, 2023.

Photo: There are always new theories to test and experiments to try. Even when we've completely nailed how Earth works, there's still the rest of the Universe to explore! Fourier telescope experiment photo by courtesy of NASA .

1: Galileo demonstrates that objects fall at the same speed (1589)

Photo: Galileo proved that different things fall at the same speed.

2: Isaac Newton splits white light into colors (1672)

Artwork: A glass prism splits white light into a spectrum. Nature recreates Newton's famous experiment whenever you see a rainbow!

3: Henry Cavendish weighs the world (1798)

Artwork: Henry Cavendish's experiment seen from above. 1) Two small balls, connected by a stick, are suspended by a thread so they're free to rotate. 2) The balls are attracted by two much larger (more massive) balls, fixed in place. 3) A light beam shines from the side at a mirror (green), mounted so it moves with the small balls. The beam is reflected back onto a measuring scale. 4) As the two sets of balls attract, the mirror pivots, shifting the reflected beam along the scale, so allowing the movement to be measured.

4: Thomas Young proves light is a wave... or does he? (1803)

Artwork: Thomas Young's famous double-slit experiment proved that light behaved like a wave—at least, some of the time. Left: A laser (1) produces coherent (regular, in-step) light (2) that passes through a pair of slits (3) onto a screen (4). If Newton were completely correct, we'd expect to see a single bright area on the screen and darkness either side. What we actually see is shown on the right. Light appears to ripple out in waves from the two slits (5), producing a distinctive interference pattern of light and dark areas (6).

5: James Prescott Joule demonstrates the conservation of energy (1840)

Artwork: The "Mechanical Equivalent of Heat"—James Prescott Joule's famous experiment proving the law now known as the conservation of energy.

6: Hippolyte Fizeau measures the speed of light (1851)

Artwork: How Fizeau measured the speed of light.

7: Robert Millikan measures the charge on the electron (1909)

Artwork: How Millikan measured the charge on the electron. 1) Oil drops (yellow) are squirted into the experimental apparatus, which has a large positive plate (blue) on top and a large negative plate (red) beneath. 2) X rays (green) are fired in. 3) The X rays give the oil drops a negative electrical charge. 4) The negatively charged drops can be made to "float" in between the two plates so their weight (red) is exactly balanced by the upward electrical pull of the positive plate (blue). When these two forces are equal, we can easily calculate the charge on the drops, which is always a whole number multiple of the basic charge on the electron.

8: Ernest Rutherford (and associates) split the atom (1897–1932)

Artwork: Transmutation: When Rutherford fired alpha particles (helium nuclei) at nitrogen, he produced oxygen. As he later wrote: "We must conclude that the nitrogen atom is disintegrated under the intense forces developed in a close collision with a swift alpha particle, and that the hydrogen atom which is liberated formed a constituent part of the nitrogen nucleus." In other words, he had split one atom apart to make another one.

Artwork: In Rutherford's gold-foil experiment (also known as the Geiger-Marsden experiment), atoms in a sheet of gold foil (1) allow positively charged alpha particles to pass through them (2) as long as the particles are traveling clear of the nucleus. Any particles fired at the nucleus are deflected by its positive charge (3). Fired at exactly the right angle, they will bounce right back! While this experiment is not splitting any atoms, as such, it was a key part of the decades-long effort to understand what atoms are made of—and in that sense, it did help physicists to "split" (venture inside) the atom.

9: Enrico Fermi demonstrates the nuclear chain reaction (1942)

Artwork: The nuclear chain reaction that turns uranium-235 into uranium-236 with a huge release of energy.

10: Rosalind Franklin photographs DNA with X rays (1953)

Artwork: The double-helix structure of DNA. Photographed with X rays, these intertwined curves appear as an X shape. Studying the X pattern in one of Franklin's photos was an important clue that tipped off Crick and Watson about the double helix.

If you liked this article...

Don't want to read our articles try listening instead, find out more, on this website.

• Six Easy Pieces by Richard Feynman. Basic Books, 2011. This book isn't half as "easy" as the title suggests, but it does contain interesting introductions to some of the topics covered here, including the conservation of energy, the double-slit experiment, and quantum theory.
• The Oxford Handbook of the History of Physics by Jed Z. Buchwald and Robert Fox (eds). Oxford University Press, 2013/2017. A collection of twenty nine scholarly essays charting the history of physics from Galileo's gravity to the age of silicon chips.
• Great Experiments in Physics: Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to Einstein Edited by Maurice Shamos. Dover, 1959/1987. This is one of my favorite science books, ever. It's a great compilation of some classic physics experiments (including four of those listed here—the experiments by Henry Cavendish, Thomas Young, James Joule, and Robert Millikan) written by the experimenters themselves. A rare opportunity to read firsthand accounts of first-rate science!

Text copyright © Chris Woodford 2012, 2023. All rights reserved. Full copyright notice and terms of use .

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CERN Accelerating science

Experiments

A range of experiments at CERN investigate physics from cosmic rays to supersymmetry

Diverse experiments at CERN

CERN is home to a wide range of experiments. Scientists from institutes all over the world form experimental collaborations to carry out a diverse research programme , ensuring that CERN covers a wealth of topics in physics, from the Standard Model to supersymmetry and from exotic isotopes to cosmic rays .

Several collaborations run experiments using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the most powerful accelerator in the world. In addition, fixed-target experiments, antimatter experiments and experimental facilities make use of the LHC injector chain.

LHC experiments

Nine experiments at the Large Hadron Collider  (LHC) use detectors to analyse the myriad of particles produced by collisions in the accelerator . These experiments are run by collaborations of scientists from institutes all over the world. Each experiment is distinct and characterised by its detectors.

The biggest of these experiments, ATLAS and CMS , use general-purpose detectors to investigate the largest range of physics possible. Having two independently designed detectors is vital for cross-confirmation of any new discoveries made.  ALICE and LHCb  have detectors specialised for focussing on specific phenomena. These four detectors sit underground in huge caverns on the LHC ring.

The smallest experiments on the LHC are  TOTEM  and  LHCf , which focus on "forward particles" – protons or heavy ions that brush past each other rather than meeting head on when the beams collide. TOTEM uses detectors positioned on either side of the CMS interaction point, while LHCf is made up of two detectors which sit along the LHC beamline, at 140 metres either side of the ATLAS collision point.  MoEDAL-MAPP uses detectors deployed near LHCb to search for a hypothetical particle called the magnetic monopole. FASER and SND@LHC , the two newest LHC experiments, are situated close to the ATLAS collision point in order to search for light new particles and to study neutrinos.

MoEDAL-MAPP

Fixed-target experiments.

In “fixed-target” experiments, a beam of accelerated particles is directed at a solid, liquid or gas target, which itself can be part of the detection system. 

COMPASS , which looks at the structure of hadrons – particles made of quarks – uses beams from the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS).

The SPS also feeds the North Area (NA), which houses a number of experiments. NA61/SHINE studies a phase transition between hadrons and quark-gluon plasma, and conducts measurements for experiments involving cosmic rays and long-baseline neutrino oscillations. NA62 uses protons from the SPS to study rare decays of kaons. NA63 directs beams of electrons and positrons onto a variety of targets to study radiation processes in strong electromagnetic fields. NA64 is looking for new particles that would mediate an unknown interaction between visible matter and dark matter. NA65 studies the production of tau neutrinos. UA9 is investigating how crystals could help to steer particle beams in high-energy colliders.

The CLOUD experiment uses beams from the  Proton Synchrotron (PS) to investigate a possible link between cosmic rays and cloud formation. DIRAC , which is now analysing data, is investigating the strong force between quarks.

Antimatter experiments

Currently the Antiproton Decelerator and ELENA serve several experiments that are studying antimatter and its properties:  AEGIS, ALPHA ,  ASACUSA ,  BASE and  GBAR . PUMA is designed to carry antiprotons to ISOLDE . Earlier experiments ( ATHENA , ATRAP  and ACE ) are now completed.

Experimental facilities

Experimental facilities at CERN include ISOLDE , MEDICIS , the neutron time-of-flight facility (n_TOF) and the CERN Neutrino Platform .

CERN Neutrino Platform

Non-accelerator experiments.

Not all experiments rely on CERN’s accelerator complex. AMS , for example, is a CERN-recognised experiment located on the International Space Station, which has its control centre at CERN. The CAST and OSQAR experiments are both looking for hypothetical dark matter particles called axions.

Past experiments

CERN’s experimental programme has consisted of hundreds of experiments spanning decades.

Among these were pioneering experiments for electroweak physics, a branch of physics that unifies the electromagnetic and weak fundamental forces . In 1958, an experiment at the Synchrocyclotron discovered a rare pion decay that spread CERN’s name around the world. Then in 1973, the Gargamelle bubble chamber presented first direct evidence of the weak neutral current. Ten years later, CERN physicists working on the UA1 and UA2 detectors announced the discovery of the W boson in January and Z boson in June – the two carriers of the electroweak force. Two key scientists behind the discoveries – Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer – received the Nobel prize in physics in 1984.

From 1989, the Large Electron-Positron collider (LEP) enabled the ALEPH , DELPHI , L3 and OPAL experiments to put the Standard Model of particle physics on a strong experimental basis. In 2000, LEP made way for the construction of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the same tunnel.

CERN’s huge contributions to electroweak physics are just some of the highlights of the experiments over the years.

July 27, 2023

The Most Surprising Discoveries in Physics

Experts weigh in on the most shocking, paradigm-shifting and delightful findings in the history of physics

By Clara Moskowitz

sakkmesterke/Getty Images

Ever since Isaac Newton and the falling apple , surprises have often pushed physics forward. Many truths about the universe we live in and the particles that make up ourselves and the world around us, as well as the forces that drive them, seemed to come out of left field when they were first discovered. For instance, scientists once thought atoms were the smallest bits of matter in existence until they split atomic nuclei to find protons and neutrons, which in turn proved to be made of even smaller fundamental particles, called quarks. And it was less than 100 years ago that researchers found out the Milky Way wasn’t the only galaxy in the cosmos but rather one of billions.

The surprises in the history of physics are far too many to comprehensively describe, but we polled a variety of physicists for some of their favorites. A few discoveries, such as the accelerating expansion of the universe , were so groundbreaking that multiple experts picked them as top choices. And many of these events occurred relatively recently, showing that the field of physics continues to astound us. Here’s a selection of physicists’ responses on the most amazing, stunning and flabbergasting findings.

Dark Energy

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One of the most shocking findings in the history of physics was the discovery of dark energy just before the turn of the millennium. None of us working in physics saw that coming! The observations that distant supernovae are dimmer than expected led to the idea that the universe is not just expanding but accelerating. These objects are very well understood, no matter how far back in time they are observed, so alternative explanations just don’t work. The name “dark energy” was given to the material that causes this acceleration. After the initial discovery, many other observations of different types confirmed this result, such as studies of the cosmic microwave background, which is the leftover light from the big bang, and studies of clusters of galaxies. The list goes on and on. We now have a standard model of cosmology in which the ordinary matter and energy that we experience in our daily lives—our body, the air we breathe, the walls around us, and all the stars and planets—add up to only 5 percent of the content of the universe. Most of the universe is “the dark side”: the universe is thought to consist of 25 percent dark matter and 70 percent dark energy. I, for one, am working to identify the nature of these mysterious components.

This discovery of dark energy in particular created a paradigm shift. The simplest explanation [for dark energy] would be a cosmological constant originally introduced by Albert Einstein as a possible term in the equations of the general theory of relativity but then abandoned by him as his “biggest blunder.” Now it seems he may have been right after all. The trouble is that the predicted value for the cosmological constant from calculations using quantum field theory produces a number that is too large by a factor of 10 120 . Editor’s Note: If the constant was this large, the universe would have expanded much, much faster than it did .] This conundrum has been known for some time, and theorists conjectured that there must be some physics that drives the number down to zero instead [to match the observed expansion history of the universe]. Now with the discovery of dark energy, however, the number must be driven down to a particular tiny value [rather than zero to explain the accelerating expansion], which is much harder to explain. This cosmological constant problem is thought by many to be the deepest unsolved problems in all of modern physics.” — Katherine Freese, University of Texas at Austin

Expanding Universe

I think the accelerating expansion of the universe has to be a strong contender. I’ve read references published around 1990 that talk confidently about how we will soon use supernovae to measure the rate at which the expansion of the universe is  decelerating and the curvature of the cosmos and how this will tell us about the ultimate fate of our universe (because closed matter-dominated universes undergo a ‘ big crunch ,’ while open ones expand forever)—very little of which applies to the dark-energy-dominated, spatially-flat cosmos that we appear to actually live in! I think this also qualifies because even with the benefit of hindsight, it still seems very surprising that the dark energy/cosmological constant has its measured value. — Tracy Slatyer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Charmed Quarks and Accelerating Cosmos

The most spectacular discoveries in fundamental physics since I started graduate school in 1973 have been the following: (1) The discovery in October 1974 of the J/psi particle, interpreted in terms of a new quark, the charmed quark , which gave dramatic confirmation to the then emerging Standard Model of particle physics. (2) The discovery in the late 1990s that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, apparently because of a tiny but nonzero energy density of the vacuum, upending many of our ideas about the cosmos. —Edward Witten, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, N.J.

Black Holes

One of the most surprising discoveries in the history of physics is Karl Schwarzschild’s black hole solution of the Einstein equation. [ Editor’s Note: Schwarzschild calculated the first exact solution to Einstein’s field equation of general relativity, and the solution predicted the existence of black holes .]

It is apocryphally said that when Einstein discovered his highly nonlinear equation, he thought an exact solution would never be found, but Schwarzschild proved him wrong only months later. Yet the structure of the solution was so surprising that many thought black holes did not exist. Einstein himself wrote in 1939 that [“the ‘Schwarzschild singularities’ do not exist in physical reality”]. It is only a century later, with the recent direct LIGO [Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory] and EHT [Event Horizon Telescope] observations of black holes that the last shreds of disbelief have been stamped out.” — Andrew Strominger, Harvard University

It’s got to be the flexibility of spacetime. Let’s say I hop on a really fast rocket or go very close to a black hole and then return to where I started. If I go fast enough on the rocket or go close enough to the black hole, I can have only 10 minutes go by on my watch while 10,000 years go by for Earthlings. This is an experimentally verified time machine that lets you travel to the future ! — Edgar Shaghoulian, University of California, Santa Cruz

I think my favorite event in physics was the prediction of the existence of the neutrino [a subatomic particle with no charge and very little mass] because so much of our fundamental approach to physics today grew out of that moment. The neutrino prediction by Wolfgang Pauli was one of the first examples of taking energy and momentum conservation seriously—you must either explain nuclear beta decay [a common radioactive process] by violating this conservation law or by introducing a new particle. The neutrino would be the first new particle predicted that wasn’t obvious in everyday life. Today predictions for new ghostlike particles are almost a dime a dozen, but in the early part of the last century, introducing potentially unobservable particles simply wasn’t done. When Enrico Fermi introduced the interaction explaining why the neutrino was so unlikely to be observed, he predicted the first new force [the weak nuclear force] beyond the two that are obvious in everyday life (gravity and electromagnetism). Today physicists consider many new types of forces all the time, but back then that just wasn’t in the picture. The idea of unifying forces, which is so essential to physics today, grew out of the discovery of Fermi’s ‘weak force’ that the neutrino feels. One of the most amazing examples that shows quantum mechanics makes sense as a theory, because it can happen on kilometer scales, where we can really see it, comes from neutrino physics. So that moment, when Pauli predicted the neutrino, is my favorite surprise because of all the paths it led to in physics. — Janet Conrad, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Oscillations

I would say the discovery of neutrino oscillations is up there for me. Neutrinos themselves were predicted to exist by Pauli and subsequently discovered in a great demonstration of the power of theory. But what makes neutrinos incredibly interesting little particles is the fact that they have mass and can change flavors, which requires a modification of the Standard Model of particle physics. — Sanjana Curtis, University of Chicago

Long ago two ancient Greek savants, Democritus and Leucippus, argued that matter consists of atoms, a notion that would be confirmed more than two millennia later. I recently coined the word ‘ leucippity ’ to characterize those speculative hypotheses that wait many years for widespread acceptance. My new word honors the elder of the two proponents of the atomic hypothesis, Leucippus.

Isaac Newton concluded that light consists of particles in 1672; Christiaan Huygens developed his wave theory of light six years later. Who got it right? The question lingered for two centuries until James Clerk Maxwell’s profound and leucippitous discovery that light favors Huygens’s wave theory. (Later on Einstein would have his say on this matter.) Leucippity abounds in science. Alfred Wegener’s prescient ‘geopoetry’ of drifting continents emerged as the mature science of plate tectonics half a century afterward. More recently, the discovery of a boson [the Higgs boson] first imagined by Peter Higgs and a few others in 1964 was triumphantly announced at CERN [the European laboratory for particle physics near Geneva] on July 4, 2012. Lastly, the gravitational waves produced by mergers of black-hole pairs were detected by LIGO in 2015, a full century after their existence had been proposed by Einstein. Leucippity again! —Sheldon Lee Glashow, Harvard University

Phase Transitions

In my opinion, one of the most incredible and surprising experimental findings in physics resulted from when the pioneer of helium liquefaction, Heike Onnes, performed experiments in which he cooled metals such as gold, platinum and mercury to liquid helium temperatures. On the same day that he found that the electrical resistance of mercury dropped to effectively zero at liquid helium temperatures, he also found that [using a vacuum pump] on a normal liquid helium sample caused the liquid to further cool and aggressively boil before suddenly becoming placid. This is incredible! On the same day Onnes discovered both the phase transition to a state of superconductivity in mercury and the phase transition to the state of superfluidity in helium. — Charles Brown, Yale University

Bell and Michelson-Morley

Two discoveries— Bell’s theorem and the Michelson-Morley interferometry experiment —upended our understandings of space, time and the nature of reality, so I can’t resist voting for them both.

The American Physical Society calls the Michelson-Morley experiment “ what might be regarded as the most famous failed experiment to date .” Until the experiment was performed in 1887, scientists believed that light waves propagate through a medium that scientists called the luminiferous aether. After all, sound waves propagate through air, and surfers’ waves propagate through water. But Albert Michelson and Edward Morley provided strong evidence that light is different; it needs no medium. This lack paved the path for Einstein’s special theory of relativity (nothing can travel more quickly than light, E = mc 2 [the c stands for the speed of light in a vacuum], how short an object looks depends on how quickly you’re moving relative to it, etcetera), which led to his general theory of relativity (spacetime has a shape).

Bell’s theorem [named after John Stewart Bell] revealed that quantum systems have wonky relationships with information and with each other. Ordinarily, if you know everything about a pair of systems—say, everything about a pair of people named Audrey and Baxter—then you know everything about each individual—everything about Audrey and everything about Baxter. But if Audrey and Baxter are labels of quantum particles, then you can know everything about the pair without knowing anything about the individuals. Information can be not in one particle and not in the other but sort of in the relationship between the two: the whole is greater than the sum of its parts in quantum physics. Bell’s insight paved the path for the quantum computers and networks now under construction across the world. — Nicole Yunger Halpern, University of Maryland, author of  Quantum Steampunk

Here are a few surprising discoveries that pop into my mind, in no particular order:

(1) Special relativity: the fact that the speed of light is constant, irrespective of the frame of reference.

(2) General relativity : the fact that gravity represents a curvature of spacetime.

(3) The expansion of the universe, the ensuing big bang model and the fact that the expansion is accelerating.

(4) The ‘unreasonable’ effectiveness of mathematics in formulating the fundamental laws of nature.

(5) The probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics . —Mario Livio, astrophysicist

Online Event

The greatest physics experiments in the world.

SAVE 20% ON A SERIES TICKET 

When the legends of physics such as Galileo, Newton and Faraday were driving forward our knowledge of the Universe, they did so with simple tabletop equipment, working in small basement laboratories. Today, physicists collaborate on gigantic experiments with colleagues from across the world to explore the fundamental nature of reality and to see further into the Universe than ever before.

In this new series you can hear from experts at the leading-edge of scientific discovery, who work on enormous experiments like the Large Hadron Collider or the James Webb Space Telescope. Find out how these incredible facilities get built, how thousands of scientists collaborate effectively and what these incredible experiments are telling us about the nature of our Universe.

Fermilab: Solving the Mysteries of Matter and Energy, Space and Time with Don Lincoln, Senior Scientist, Fermilab

Tuesday 4 April | 6-7pm BST | 1-2pm EDT | On-demand 

Join Fermilab senior scientist Don Lincoln, as he explains how America’s flagship particle physics facility has taught us so much about our universe and how it works.

Founded in 1967, and renamed to celebrate Enrico Fermi in 1974, Fermilab is America’s flagship particle physics facility located just west of Chicago. Responsible for the discovery of the top and bottom quarks, the tau neutrino, and much more besides, Fermilab is a leading laboratory, exploring the frontiers of physics research.

In this talk, Fermilab Senior Scientist Don Lincoln will explore how decades of Fermilab research have taught us so much about our universe and how it works. He will then share the future research plans for the facility, probing the mysteries of neutrinos, antimatter and a persistent puzzle involving muons. Don will also explain how the results from Fermilab, and other experiments, are helping theorists in their quest for the elusive ‘Theory of Everything’.

James Webb Space Telescope: Opening the Infrared Treasure Chest with John Mather, Senior Astrophysicist, NASA

Wednesday 17 May 2023 | 6-7pm BST | 1-2pm EDT | On-demand

Join Nobel prizewinning astrophysicist John Mather as he discusses the groundbreaking James Webb Space Telescope.

The JWST, which launched in 2021 and began science operations in 2022, is now peering into the past to find the first objects that formed after the big bang and to study the first black holes, the growth of galaxies, the formation of stars and planetary systems, and more. About 100 times more powerful than the celebrated Hubble Space Telescope, JWST could observe a bumblebee at the Earth-moon distance, in reflected sunlight and thermal emission, and it promises to reveal many wonders of our universe.

In this talk, senior project scientist for JWST and Nobel prizewinning astrophysicist John Mather will discuss how NASA and its partners built JWST and share some of the telescope’s first discoveries

Secrets of the Large Hadron Collider  with Clara Nellist, Particle Physicist and Science Communicator

Available on-demand (recorded live on Tuesday 7 February 2023)

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider, which made headlines around the world following the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012. However, research at the LHC encompasses so much more, with 17,500 people from across the world coming together to solve the toughest problems in physics; from the mysteries of dark matter to why there is more matter than antimatter in the Universe.

Join particle physicist Dr Clara Nellist, part of the ATLAS Experiment at the LHC, for a deep dive into the past, present and future of this incredible facility. From its conception in the 1990s via the breakthrough discoveries of the past 13 years, to the ground-breaking science yet to come, Clara will reveal how the LHC continues to expand our knowledge of the Universe, and what’s it’s like to work on one of the world’s greatest physics experiments. 

Related events

Opening the infrared treasure chest with the James Webb space telescope

How did NASA build the JWST and what has it already revealed? 

 Join Nobel prizewinning astrophysicist John Mather as he discusses the groundbreaking James Webb Space Telescope.

The JWST, which launched in 2021 and began science operations in 2022, is now peering into the past to find the first objects that formed after the big bang and to study the first black holes, the growth of galaxies, the formation of stars and planetary systems, and more. About 100 times more powerful than the celebrated Hubble Space Telescope, JWST could observe a bumblebee at the Earth-moon distance, in reflected sunlight and thermal emission, and it promises to reveal many wonders of our universe. 

17 May 2023

Fermilab: solving the mysteries of matter and energy, space and time

Join Fermilab Senior Scientist Don Lincoln on Tuesday 4th April as he explores how decades of Fermilab research have taught us so much about our universe and how it works. He will then share the future research plans for the facility, probing the mysteries of neutrinos, antimatter and a persistent puzzle involving muons. Don will also explain how the results from Fermilab, and other experiments, are helping theorists in their quest for the elusive ‘Theory of Everything’.

Booking information:

The online events will be held at the folloiwing times and and will last for approximately one hour. 

Fermilab: Solving the Mysteries of Matter and Energy, Space and Time Tuesday 4 April | 6-7pm BST | 1-2pm EDT 

James Webb Space Telescope: Opening the Infrared Treasure Chest Wednesday 17 May 2023 | 6-7pm BST | 1-2pm EDT

Secrets of the Large Hadron Collider - available on-demand (recorded live on Tuesday 7 February 202)

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