Cyprus has submitted an application to become a full member of CERN, the world’s largest particle physics laboratory, which is situated in the northwest suburbs of Geneva on the Franco-Swiss border.
The scientific community of Cyprus deems that the benefits from Cyprus’ full CERN membership will be huge, since the know–how and the knowledge of CERN will be applied in various areas in Cyprus as well.
In an interview with CNA, Professor of Physics at the University of Cyprus, Panos Razis, talked about the importance of Cyprus’ membership to CERN, as well as the re-launch of the world famous experiment in CERN, with the first attempt to circulate a beam in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) that would offer a series of data for understanding the law of nature right after the Big Bang that created the universe 13.7 billion years ago.
Thousands of scientists from all over the world participate in the experiment that is to be re-launched in November, among them a team of scientists under Professor Razis.
In his interview with CNA the Cypriot scientist talked about another experiment in which his team participates, which envisages to allow the examination of very distant areas of the universe by using a “neutrinos’ telescope”.
Regarding Cyprus’ application to become a full member of CERN, Razis said the application would be examined in December 2010.
“The importance of Cyprus’ upcoming accession to CERN as full member of the family is huge. Apart from the scientific benefits, one must bear in mind that CERN is the world’s largest research center,” Razis explained.
He went on to add that “through the physics experiments and other programmes of CERN, in the areas of education and medicine for instance, a large number of Cypriots who are interested in those fields, will be benefited”.
“Moreover, through various international conferences and summer schools organized in CERN, the know–how will eventually pass to Cyprus in many areas of application since physics is the mother and inspiration of all applied sciences”, Razis told CNA.
Founded in 1954, the CERN Laboratory, astride the Franco–Swiss border near Geneva, was one of Europe’s first joint ventures and now has 20 member states.
Regarding the CERN experiment, which is to be restarted this autumn, he said that Cyprus has been actively participating in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments through the High Energy Physics Laboratory of the University of Cyprus.
He explained that the CERN experiment would address questions such as what gives matter its mass, of what the invisible 96% of the Universe is made, why nature prefers matter to antimatter and how matter evolved from the first instants of the Universe’s existence.
“One other fascinating scenario is to discover that there are more than four dimensions which could explain why gravity is weaker that the other three powers of the universe”, Razis said.
The Cypriot Professor was also asked about an ongoing experiment, with the participation of Cyprus, concerning neutrinos, the elementary particles that often travel close to the speed of light.
Razis said that for three years now his team has been participating in a European partnership of 24 universities, to create an under sea neutrino telescope of an overall volume of 1-2 cubic kilometers.
“By examining neutrinos we can draw conclusions and study very distant areas in the universe”, he said, adding that distant stars, pulsars or supernovae could be better studied with a neutrino telescope.
