Medieval alchemists can be reaching for his or her smartphones proper now. CERN scientists have efficiently pulled off the last word transmutation trick—turning humble lead into gold utilizing the Massive Hadron Collider. However don’t anticipate a gold rush in Switzerland anytime quickly.
One thing outstanding occurs when lead nuclei almost-but-not-quite collide at speeds approaching mild’s common velocity restrict. Like two DJs completely executing a cross-fade between tracks, these near-miss encounters generate intense electromagnetic fields that knock exactly three protons out of lead atoms, remodeling them into gold. The atomic math checks out completely: lead’s 82 protons minus 3 equals gold’s 79. This sort of boundary-pushing science mirrors the breakthrough the place scientists created genuine leather using T. Rex DNA—mixing the traditional with the futuristic in methods as soon as thought unimaginable.
Catching Gold within the Act
“It’s spectacular to see that our detectors can deal with head-on collisions producing hundreds of particles, whereas additionally being delicate to collisions the place just a few particles are produced at a time,” explains Marco Van Leeuwen, ALICE spokesperson. Translation for non-particle physicists: their gear catches these golden transformations regardless that they’re extra fleeting than the newest TikTok dance development.
The method occurs at 99.999993% mild velocity—quicker than you may shut all these browser tabs when somebody walks behind your desk. At this velocity, the electromagnetic fields flatten like pancakes, creating photon pulses that set off what scientists name “electromagnetic dissociation.” You know the way relationships typically want area? Atoms at these speeds basically expertise the last word breakup.
Microscopic Treasure Hunt
“Because of the distinctive capabilities of the ALICE ZDCs, the current evaluation is the primary to systematically detect and analyse the signature of gold manufacturing on the LHC experimentally,” says Uliana Dmitrieva of the ALICE collaboration. Her crew measured gold manufacturing at round 89,000 nuclei per second—numbers that sound spectacular till you do the mathematics.
Since 2015, all CERN experiments mixed have created roughly 86 billion gold nuclei. Seems like quite a bit? That interprets to only 29 picograms—or 0.000000000029 grams. The brand new iPhone weighs about 206 grams, so that you’d have to run the collider for a very very long time to create sufficient gold for even a single smartphone part.
Past Medieval Desires
This analysis isn’t nearly proving historical alchemists weren’t utterly delusional. Like optimizing your gaming setup to stop crashes throughout an intense battle, scientists use this information to fine-tune their particle-smashing machines.
The medieval gold-seekers may be disenchanted by the microscopic yield, however they’d certainly recognize the validation. Their wildest dream—altering one component into one other—occurs routinely beneath the Swiss-French countryside in CERN’s 27-kilometer subatomic racetrack.
Subsequent time somebody claims science lacks magic, remind them we remodeled lead into gold, simply with out the treasure chest on the finish. Even Physician Unusual can’t compete with particle physics. The true gold rush isn’t within the mines—it’s in decoding the universe’s supply code.
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