CERNвЂ™s research is at an even lower level than this, in the constituents of the protons and neutrons themselves. This has nothing to do with the reactions that take place inside nuclear weapons, which involve swapping protons and neutrons inside nuclei. Take for example the N in CERN, which stands for nuclear, according to the public body UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) (opens in new tab). Fortunately, such worries are groundless. (Image credit: CERN) Is CERN dangerous?ДЇor various reasons over the years, people have speculated that experiments at CERN might pose a danger to the public. One question that AEGIS should be able to answer soon is the fascinating one of whether antimatter falls downwards in a gravitational field, like ordinary matter, or upwards in the opposite direction.ДЄEGIS uses electromagnets to trap antimatter so it doesnвЂ™t annihilate in contact with ordinary matter. The resulting anti-atoms can then be studied by a range of instruments such as AEGIS (Antihydrogen Experiment: Gravity, Interferometry and Spectroscopy). It takes antiparticles created in the Proton Synchrotron and slows them down to manageable speeds in what is effectively the exact opposite of a particle accelerator: the Antiproton Decelerator, according to CERN. This is where CERNвЂ™s Antimatter Factory comes in. If you want to create antimatter that stays around long enough for detailed study, you need more than just an accelerator. But in the usual course of events, the antiparticles don't last long before they're annihilated in collisions with ordinary particles. (Image credit: CERN)ДЄntimatter often pops into existence inside CERNвЂ™s high-energy accelerators, as one half of a particle-antiparticle pair. The MoEDAL experiment sits in the same cavern as LHCb. If itвЂ™s successful in finding any of these particles, MoEDAL could help to resolve fundamental questions such as the existence of other dimensions or the nature of dark matter. This experiment could also potentially detect certain stable massive particles that are predicted by theories beyond the Standard Model. The purpose of MoEDAL is to look out for any monopoles that might be created in collisions inside the LHC, according to CERN. Such particles have long been hypothesized, but never observed. While most CERN experiments are designed to study known particles, this one is aimed at discovering undiscovered particles that lie outside the present Standard Model.ДЄ monopole, for example, would be a magnetized particle consisting only of a north pole without a south one, or vice versa. Sharing the same underground cavern as LHCb is a smaller instrument called MoEDAL, which stands for Monopole and Exotics Detector at the LHC. These are then fired into an artificial atmosphere, where their effects can be studied much more closely. This isnвЂ™t an easy process to study in the real atmosphere, with real cosmic rays, so CERN is using the accelerator to create its own cosmic rays. ItвЂ™s been theorized that cosmic rays play a role in cloud formation by seeding tiny water droplets around the Earth. The climate experiment is called CLOUD, which stands for 'Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets'. One of the project scientists inside the CLOUD experiment chamber. This is a smaller and less sophisticated accelerator than the LHC, but itвЂ™s still capable of doing useful work. One experiment at CERNвЂ™s Proton Synchrotron is linking particle physics to climate science. Studying CP violation in particles containing beauty is one of the most promising ways to shed light on the emergence of matter-antimatter asymmetry in the early universe, according to CERN.ДЄway from the LHC, there are other facilities at CERN that are conducting important research. This asymmetry has been given the technical name CP violation, and studying it is one of the main aims of the Large Hadron ColliderвЂ™s LHCb experiment.ДЄll hadrons are made up of quarks, but LHCb is designed to detect particles that include a particularly rare type of quark known as beauty. Yet very early on, probably within the first second of the universe's existence, virtually all the antimatter had disappeared, and only the normal matter we see today remained. According to the Big Bang theory, the universe must have started out with equal amounts of both. One of the key mysteries of the universe is why it seemingly contains so much more matter than antimatter. (Image credit: Ronald Patrick/Stringer/Getty Images) CERN's experiments The Large Hadron Collider is currently shut down for maintenance, which has created an opportunity to offer access to the public.

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