News

Is The New LHC Run The End Of Particle Physics As We Know It? 

Posted on Wednesday 26th August 2015 at 8:32

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the CERN facility (the European Organisation for Nuclear Research) near Geneva, is the largest and most powerful particle accelerator in the world. It has been used in a large number of experiments, which have proved that the Standard Model of particle physics encompasses essentially every particle that makes up the universe and the forces that act upon them. The most significant of these was the discovery of the Higgs boson, the last particle predicted by th... Read more

What is the Standard Model? 

Posted on Wednesday 12th August 2015 at 8:36

The Standard Model in particle physics definitely does not suggest that the answer to life, the universe and everything is 42. However, it does give physicists a profound understanding of what life, the universe and everything is made up of. It describes the fundamental particles that essentially make up all matter and the forces that act upon them. CERN (the European Organisation for Nuclear Research) states that, "how these particles and three of the forces are related to each other is encap... Read more

Taking Steps to Mars 

Posted on Monday 29th June 2015 at 17:26

2015 will go down as the year that US space agency NASA brought us the most detailed view of Pluto yet. And in just 15 years time, according to plans already in place, NASA will conduct a manned mission to Mars, which could answer the age-old question of whether there is life on other planets. However, as Mars is approximately 225,300,000 km from the Earth, getting there is no mean feat and will need to be done in stages. Fortunately, through robotic probes and experimentation carried out on t... Read more

Samantha Cristoforetti Breaks a World Record on her First Space Mission 

Posted on Wednesday 17th June 2015 at 12:01

Between November 2014 and June 2015, Samantha Cristoforetti broke the world record for the longest space mission by a woman.  The previous record was held by Sunita Williams, who spent 195 days in space in 2012. Cristoforetti's record was set by accident when a Russian space agency freighter burnt up on re-entry causing Cristoforetti's return to be delayed by a month while the accident was investigated meaning she spent 199 days in space. This was a mission of firsts: First Mission - First... Read more