Sian Worsfold describes an extraordinary encounter between the worlds of politics and science.
The nation’s newly-minted Nobel prize winner, Professor Peter Higgs, was guest of honour at a special event arranged for Lords and MPs to celebrate the Science Museum’s groundbreaking exhibition, Collider.
On Monday night in the Palace of Westminster, a series of special events began to celebrate the launch of an exhibition that allows visitors to step inside the epic Large Hadron Collider at the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva, better known as CERN.
The opening events were kicked off by an exclusive reception in Portcullis House hosted by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST), in collaboration with the Science Museum. MPs, Lords and other distinguished guests had the opportunity to meet leading figures from the field of particle physics, including Professor Peter Higgs, Dr Stephen Myers, CERN’s Director of Accelerators and Technology, and Andrew Taylor, Executive Director of STFC National Laboratories.
Guests included Andrew Miller MP, Chair of the Science and Technology Select Committee; Liam Byrne, MP, Shadow science spokesman; Gerry Sutcliffe MP; Julian Huppert MP; Lord Jordan; Dr Lutz-Peter Berg, Science and Technology Attache for the Swiss Embassy; Dr Stephen Benn, Director of Parliamentary Affairs, Institute of Biology; and particle physicist Jon Butterworth.
They were invited to explore and interact with exhibits provided by some of the UK’s leading particle physics groups, including UCL, Imperial College, University of Cambridge and Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), and talk to researchers about their latest work.
Dr Chris Tyler, Director of POST, compered the event with the opening speech delivered by Adam Afriyie MP, Chairman of POST and former Conservative science spokesman. Ian Blatchford, Director and Chief Executive of the Science Museum Group, thanked supporters of the exhibition, which brings the epic collaborative endeavour at CERN to life with objects, cutting edge theatre and digital techniques. Curator Ali Boyle, Deputy Keeper of Science and Medicine at the museum, and Dr Harry Cliff, particle physicist at University of Cambridge and the museum’s Fellow of Modern Science, also gave an overview of the challenges of recreating the world’s greatest experiment for visitors, and treated guests to a sneak preview of the exhibition trailer.
Dr Stephen Myers, CERN’s Director of Accelerators and Technology, gave an overview of more than 40 years experience of creating collisions at CERN, while Andrew Taylor conveyed his excitement at the STFC and Science Museum working together on the exhibition.
Popular exhibits included a ping-pong accelerator provided by Professor Jordan Nash from Imperial College and a display entitled ‘What is the LHC?’ from Mark Wells at STFC. This featured a scale model of a section of the LHC, highlighting how this international endeavour has advanced a range of scientific fields, from physics and engineering to computational science. Steve Wotton from the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge entranced parliamentarians with a cloud chamber and a spark chamber, to demonstrate that high energy particles are all around us.
Guest of honour, recent Nobel Prizewinner Professor Peter Higgs, received many congratulations throughout the evening for his landmark contribution to the field of particle physics. He was in high demand with everyone, from recent science graduates and Fellows to star struck MPs. At his side was his University of Edinburgh colleague, Alan Walker.
As it began to rain outside, Professor Higgs was given a special umbrella, decorated with an image of one of the great ‘eyes’ of the vast LHC, the CMS detector.
Collider runs at the Science Museum from 13 November 2013-6 May 2014. To find out more visit sciencemuseum.org.uk/collider.