SuperKEKB KEK, Japan · since 2018 · electrons and positrons
A B-meson factory: lower energy but record luminosity.
CERN history
From 12 signatures to the biggest machine on Earth
CERN was founded in 1954 to rebuild European science after the war. Along the way came the W and Z bosons, the birth of the web, antihydrogen and the Higgs boson. These are the key points of that road.
Timeline of discoveries
Selected milestones, from the founding to today's LS3 stop.
- 1954
CERN is founded
Twelve states sign the convention creating the European Organization for Nuclear Research near Geneva. Today it is the largest particle physics laboratory in the world.
- 1957
The first accelerator: the synchrocyclotron
The SC, CERN's first machine, starts up. Two years later the Proton Synchrotron (PS) follows, and it still works in the complex today.
- 1983
Discovery of the W and Z bosons
The UA1 and UA2 experiments find the carriers of the weak force. A year later Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer receive the Nobel Prize for it.
- 1989
LEP starts and the web is proposed
The 27 km LEP collider starts up, and Tim Berners-Lee submits his proposal for what becomes the World Wide Web. In 1993 CERN releases the web into the public domain.
- 1995
The first antihydrogen atoms
The PS210 experiment produces the first atoms of antimatter. In 2010 the ALPHA experiment learns to trap them for longer.
- 2008
The LHC starts
On 10 September the first beam circulates in the Large Hadron Collider, built in the former LEP tunnel. Regular collisions begin in 2010.
- 4 July 2012
Discovery of the Higgs boson
ATLAS and CMS announce the discovery of the particle hunted for half a century. In 2013 Francois Englert and Peter Higgs receive the Nobel Prize.
- 2015 to 2018
Run 2: 13 TeV
After the first long shutdown the LHC returns with almost twice the energy and many times more data.
- 2022 to 2026
Run 3: a record 13.6 TeV
The longest and most intense run of the machine. CERN summed it up as exceeding every expectation.
- 2023
Science Gateway opens
The new visitor centre designed by Renzo Piano: exhibitions, labs and a planetarium, open regardless of whether the accelerators run.
- from July 2026
Long Shutdown 3now
After the final Run 3 collisions the machine enters the biggest rebuild in its history, preparing the HL-LHC era around 2030.
The world's great accelerators
Rings drawn to a square-root scale and collision energies on a log scale.
Tevatron Fermilab, USA · 1983 to 2011 · protons and antiprotons
The world's most powerful collider for a quarter century; discovered the top quark.
LHC CERN · since 2008 · protons and lead ions
The current record holder: a 26.7 km ring and the Higgs boson to its name.
FCC (concept) CERN · decision around 2028 · protons eventually
Feasibility study concluded in 2025: a ring of roughly 91 km.