欧核中心主任预测LHC或年内揭开暗物质神秘面纱

Big Bang machine will reveal mysteries of dark matter this year, predicts Cern chief
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 4:42 PM on 09th March 2010
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1256666/Dark-matter-Large-Hadron-Collider-reveal-95-universe.html#ixzz0hqx2xsWh

The world's largest atom smasher is poised to make its first discoveries into the elusive nature of dark matter, the director of the European Organization for Nuclear Research said.

Rolf-Dieter Heuer said the team at Cern hope the Large Hadron Collider will make its first scientific breakthroughs later this year.

                               
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The magnet core of the world's largest superconducting solenoid magnet inside the Large Hadron Collider at Cern

If all goes to plan, scientists plan to send seven trillion electron volts around the huge machine later this month. This will be three times more energy than the previous energy record set in November.

By crashing high energy beams of protons into each other in a 17-mile tunnel under the Swiss-French border at Geneva, Cern's scientists hope to gain key insights into the makeup of matter and the creation of the universe billions of years ago in the moments after the Big Bang.

There have been no discoveries so far with the LHC, Professor Heuer said. But he predicted breakthroughs soon into the mysterious dark matter that scientists believe comprises a quarter of the whole universe.

'We will open a door for new physics at the end of this year,' Professor Heuer said.

'It took several decades for us to understand the visible universe. This is all nicely explained by the standard model, but the big problem is that this is only 5 percent of the universe.'

                               
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Professor Rolf-Dieter Heuer, Director General of CERN, explains how they will ramp up the energy levels this year

Cern's experiments represent a massive effort among 7,000 scientists from over 80 countries into better understanding nature and how it works.

Like most discoveries in particle physics, the true significance of breakthroughs in dark matter, antimatter or dark energy would only become clear after the revelations are made.

Professor Heuer likened the situation to the 1932 discovery of the positron, which has since become a key tool in diagnosing and tracking human cancer.

Dark matter is a particularly tricky subject. Theorized by scientists who couldn't understand missing mass and strangely bent light in faraway galaxies, dark matter has become widely accepted in the physics community without its existence ever being concretely proven.

These invisible substances cannot be seen through telescopes or advanced instruments. And they are separate from everything we see in the universe - ourselves, objects on this Earth, the planets, the stars and the galaxies - which account for a small fraction of all matter. But dark matter's effect on gravity is significant.

Scientists believe that dark matter makes galaxies spin faster than expected, and that it can affect the light of visible matter in ways we can't understand.

A separate entity called "dark energy" makes up the remaining 70 percent of the universe, and this is understood as associated with the vacuum that is evenly distributed in space and time. It is believed to accelerate the expansion of the universe.

CERN's collider 'could be the ideal machine to shed the first light into the dark universe,' Professor Heuer said, saying that experiments would soon be able to disprove some theories about dark matter and possibly find elements that are completely new.

The machine recently restarted after a two and a half month winter shutdown during which scientists made improvements and checked out the smasher's ability to collide protons at higher energy levels.

The collider will run at 7 TeV through next year, before being shut down in 2012 to upgrade to full design energy of 14 TeV. It will then restart in 2013, with a long-term goal of revealing the Higgs boson, or "God particle," so named because scientists believe it gives mass to other matter.

'The Higgs particle is not easy to find,' Professor Heuer said.

'We know everything about the Higgs particle, except if it exists.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1256666/Dark-matter-Large-Hadron-Collider-reveal-95-universe.html

这是网易上的译文，不过译的不是一般的烂。最重要的，把 7TeV（7 trillion eV）译成了7兆电子伏，7MeV，这个数北京的小家伙都能做到。

网易探索3月11日报道 据英国媒体《每日邮报》报道，欧洲核子研究中心（CERN）负责人洛夫-迪特·霍耶尔（Rolf-Dieter Heuer）表示，世界最大的原子对撞机（LHC）即将做出其关于暗物质神秘性质的第一个发现，大型强子对撞机将在今年下半年科学研究中实现其首次突破。

如果一切按照计划，科学家预计将在本月下旬进行7兆电子伏特能量的对撞实验，此次能量将是去年11月记录能量的三倍多。科学家们希望通过位于瑞士日内瓦郊区的瑞法边境附近、一座长17公里的地下隧道进行高能束质子对撞实验，以借助强子对撞机的巨大能量来获得关于宇宙大爆炸后物质组成和宇宙创造的关键发现。

教授霍耶尔表示：“目前大型强子对撞机还没有获得相关发现。但预计很快会取得关于神秘暗物质的突破性发现，届时将会打开新物理学的一扇门。我们相信整个宇宙的1/4由暗物质组成。我们花了好几年时间研究可视宇宙，这些都可以由标准模型很好地解释，但问题是‘可视宇宙’仅是整个宇宙的5%。”

如同粒子物理研究领域的其他发现一样，在此次新发现后，对暗物质、反物质或者暗能量的突破性发现的真正意义会变得更加明确。教授霍耶尔把此次发现的意义等同于1932年正电子的发现，那次发现使正电子成为了诊断及追踪人类癌症的重要工具。

暗物质目前还是一个棘手的科研课题。科学家们还无法理解遥远星系的失踪质量和奇怪的折射光线，理论上暗物质已被物理学领域广泛接受，但目前还没有其存在的具体证明。这些不可见物质无法通过望远镜或其他先进仪器看到，它们独立于我们现在从宇宙中看到的一切，包括我们自己、地球、行星 、恒星以及星系上的其他一切物体，而所有这些（我们所能理解的世界物质）仅占宇宙所有事物的一小部分，但是暗物质对宇宙的影响却非常重要。

科学家们相信，暗物质使星系的旋转速度高于预期，并且它会以一种我们无法理解的方式影响光对可见物质的作用。在暗物质理论中，一个被称为“暗能量”的单独物质构成了剩余宇宙的70%，该物质与均匀分布在空间和时间的真空联系在一起，据说这种物质会加快宇宙的膨胀。霍耶尔表示：欧洲核子研究中心的对撞机是为黑暗的宇宙送上第一缕光芒的理想机器。这次实验将就会推翻一些关于暗物质的理论，并且可能发现全新的物质。

据报道，此前，大型强子对撞机由于事故停工了两个半月，其间科学家们对其进行了改进，并核查其承受更高能量水平碰撞质子实验的能力。据悉，最近将会重新启动该对撞机。


据悉，该大型强子对撞机将在明年把质子加速到7兆电子伏特（TeV）的能量，而在2012年之前会停止工作，以进行调整使其能够使质子对撞总能量达到14兆电子伏特。它将在2013年被重新启动，届时将执行长期目标，以揭示希格斯玻色子或“上帝粒子”（ 之所以被如此命名，是因为科学家们相信它是其他物质的重要组成部分）的相关信息。

霍耶尔表示：“希格斯玻色子不容易被找到。除了证明它的存在，我们已经知道一切关于希格斯玻色子的信息。”

http://discover.news.163.com/10/0311/09/61G1ORAU000125LI.html

文章的最后一句：'We know everything about the Higgs particle, except if it exists.'
网易的译文是：除了证明它的存在，我们已经知道一切关于希格斯玻色子的信息。

我将其译为：除了不知道Higgs粒子是否是存在的，我们知道Higgs粒子的一切。

很无奈的一句话，自Higgs粒子被提出迄今已几十年，对它的研究多如牛毛，但就是不知道是不是真的有这个东西。也许事实真的会是我们用了几十年的时间研究了一个根本不存在的东西。不过，即使如此，也只能接受，理论的发展就是如此。

不过，说我们知道了Higgs的一切，我想这是cern主任对媒体说的简洁的说法，实际上，关于Higgs粒子，可以说它的最重要的一个性质我们还不知道：就是它到底体重如何？而这，也是Higgs难以寻找的一个重要原因。

关于LHC，每日邮报还有一篇文章，我没找是否有译文，感兴趣的可以翻译下。
Large Hadron Collider will finally reach full power in 2013... eight years behind schedule
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/scien ... years-schedule.html

我猜测Higgs粒子是不存在的,
当然没有任何证据, 纯属瞎猜,

现在物理学家打扮得都很范...