Large Hadron Rap

[Tomi Maila]

If you're into physics and have not yet seen this awesome video of LHC at CERN, go ahead and click play.

[TobyD]

QUOTE (Tomi Maila @ Aug 14 2008, 10:01 AM)

If you're into physics and have not yet seen this awesome video of LHC at CERN, go ahead and click play.

That's good for an educational laugh. It reminded me of the song Why Does the Sun Shine? by They Might Be Giants (except not nearly as catchy).

Maybe when they turn on the LHC we'll finally find out if http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor' rel='nofollow' target="_blank">John Titor was legit :ninja:

[PaulG.]

The CERN is awesome. And they're using LabVIEW to control a lot of it. And ... on a lighter note ... some physicists are concerned about the possiblity of the CERN creating, among other exotic things, a mini black hole that could escape, orbit through the earth and gradually swallow us up in a matter of days …

[AnalogKid2DigitalMan]

I wrote the LV code to verify the diameters of the various layers in the optical fibers in real-time while we were drawing them, over a million meters are in used in the Compact Muon Solenoid. I hope it works!

[Tomi Maila]

QUOTE (PaulG. @ Aug 14 2008, 08:22 PM)

And ... on a lighter note ... some physicists are concerned about the possiblity of the CERN creating, among other exotic things, a mini black hole that could escape, orbit through the earth and gradually swallow us up in a matter of days …

Luckily all educated physicists have read their Wheeler and know that small black holes would radiate so much hawking radiation that they would 'evaporate' or explode instantly. Actually I don't think an explosion of a mini black hole would look so much different from what ever happens in a proton collision anyway.

[jpdrolet]

The Earth and Moon are constantly hit by even more energetic particles (cosmic rays) every day and we haven't witness adverse effect yet *crosses fingers*

Not that I believe that crossing fingers brings good luck but I have heard that it does whether you believe it or not...

[John Lokanis]

I saw a very cool program on the LHC last month on the Science Channel. IT is being replayed on the 31st if you want to catch it.

http://science.discovery.com/tv-schedules/....125296.36136.0

-John

[LAVA 1.0 Content]

QUOTE (PaulG. @ Aug 14 2008, 12:22 PM)

The CERN is awesome. And they're using LabVIEW to control a lot of it.

A lot is a relative term in this case as the LHC includes a mind boggling number of control systems. Regardless, this is a pretty cool motion control application using 120 PXI systems distributed around the 27 km ring controlling 600 motion axes to 1ms synchronization during a 20 minute profile. All of the PXI RT systems integrate into the higher level facility control system running non-LV applications. This application was developed with a lot of direct input and support from the Systems Engineering group at NI. The CERN developer just left NI this afternoon to get ready for the startup of the LHC.

A few trivia facts:

• The design of the LHC started 27 years ago.
  
• Colling of the magnets started more than 18 months ago. The final temperature of the magnets will be below 2K.
  

[jgcode]

I misread the title as Large Hardon Rap and didn't quite know what to expect...