What is CERN?

While many people associate CERN with the LHC (Large Hadron Collider), there are many more contributions and research tools used at CERN, which have led to such things as the observation of the Higgs Boson, the development of the World Wide Web, and the creation of antimatter. The website further states that CERN aims to illuminate the makeup of the universe and find answers regarding how it functions. According to its website, CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire, or European Council for Nuclear Research) has the primary mission of acquiring knowledge and satisfying our timeless curiosity about the world and universe. They make their facilities available to researchers and scientists worldwide and seek to engineer the cooperation and sharing of information between scientists of all countries, to increase the knowledge base of humanity as a whole.

All of the research and study performed at CERN is significant and contributory; however, the most notable veins may be categorized under the subject of Physics. Below that heading, CERN is on the cutting edge of accelerator research, engineering, computer science, and forefront experimentation projects that employ the minds of scientists from all over the world and of every walk of life. This article aims to briefly illuminate those areas and further shed light on what CERN is, and how it is continually advancing human knowledge of science and the workings of the world around us and the universe itself.

CERN also hosts some of the largest OpenLab computing resources and supercomputers. According to the website:

“The cornerstone of the open-source philosophy is that the recipients of technology should have access to all its building blocks, such as software code, schematics for electronics and mechanical designs, in order to study it, modify it and redistribute it to others. Since releasing the World Wide Web software under an open-source model in 1994, CERN has continuously been a pioneer in this field. They continue supporting open-source hardware (with the CERN Open Hardware Licence), open access (with the Sponsoring Consortium for Open Access Publishing in Particle Physics – SCOAP³), and open data (with the Open Data Portal for the LHC experiments). The CERN Open Data portal is a testimony to CERN’s policy of Open Access and Open Data. The portal allows the LHC experiments to share their data with a double focus: for the scientific community, including researchers outside the CERN experimental teams, as well as citizen scientists, and for the purposes of training and education through specially curated resources.”

If world unity and humankind working together is important, and if it can be said that people endeavoring as one to learn more about whom we are, why we are here, and what is ahead is vital to our survival as a species, then nowhere else is this more a daily practice than at CERN. We see at CERN what can happen when we put aside our petty differences and ask questions together. At CERN, we see only a part of the wonders that can happen if we labor in peace and for the furtherance of all people. CERN is a microcosm demonstrating what the world could be if we saw each other as equals and viewed every mind as having something to contribute and offer. CERN is a place where everyone is a teacher, and everyone is a student. As such, it serves as a model for all of us and a goal for which to strive.