Big Bang at the atomic lab after scientists get their maths wrong

Times Online ^ | 4/8/07 | Jonathan Leake

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

No, not like gravity at all.

What happens in a synchrotron is that a radio frequency electric field is set up around the circular ring containing the ionized particles. The field is modulated to constantly acceleration the charged particles inside it. The magnets provide circular deflection to contain the ions inside the ring.

[reg45]

Oh No! Not the inch vs. millimetre thing again.

[em2vn]

Maybe the engineers who got the lens for Hubble perfectly wrong went to work for Fermilab after Hubble.

[Eastbound]

Sounds like a good plot for a Star Trek movie.

'Warp speed, Sulu!'
'Sorry, Captain. We can't get any traction.'
'Okay, head for that cinder pile over there.'
'But Captain. That's the galaxy cemetery and a burial is in progress.'
'Planet Earth, I'd guess. Those Brits again, I suppose.'
'Durn! There go my frequent flyer miles.'

[onedoug]

Applied Goreistic physics.

[Paved Paradise]

That New Math’ll get ya every time.

[ozzymandus]

Did they get inches and millimeters miked up again?

[Riley]

We represent the Lollipop Guild

I used exactly that song, on helium, to break up a really tense situation once. Nobody expected it out of me- it resulted in someone literally falling out of their chair in hysterical laughter. :-)

[mtg]

These guys need to go to Staples and get an “EASY” button.

[dayglored]

> Just paint "anti-matter" on a brick and take a pic of it and post it - FR has gotten so proudly scientifically uneducated that's all people are going to accept.

I recall seeing a funny photo of a hillbilly "New-clear Lab" -- imagine the cast of HeeHaw with stained lab coats and clipboards and horn-rimmed glasses, standing around a pile of wooden buckets and stills with signs painted on them like "microscope" and "reactor". It was a hoot, but I didn't save a copy... gotta go Google images...

[RockyMtnMan]

I suspect other scientific achievements like nano scale generators and the Z machine’s fusion generating Z pinch would be greeted with the same level of disbelief.

[Colonel Jerry USMC ret.]

Dunno about anti-matter, but I once had a girlfriend who was anti-anti-matter. Said another way: Everything-matter(ed)!

Semper Fi,

[Enterprise]

"A £2 billion project to answer some of the biggest mysteries of the universe has been delayed by months after scientists building it made basic errors in their mathematical calculations."

Must have had someone loan from NASA. But look at the bright side. This really torqued the Swiss, so it isn't all bad news.

[SunkenCiv]

[reagan_fanatic]

The machine, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), aims to recreate the conditions of the Big Bang, when the universe is thought to have exploded into existence about 14 billion years ago. However, the November start-up may now have to be delayed until next spring.

Well, we'll still be around until Spring anyways.

Party hardy while you can!

[LIConFem]

Didn’t I see this on Star Trek: Enterprise last night?

[Lazamataz]

Scientist One: "Say, what do you think will happen if I reverse the polarity?"

Scientist Two: "NO! JIM! DON'T DO TH