Japan bids to build the world`s largest collider
Baku, December 17 (AZERTAC). Japan has launched a bid to build the world`s largest particle collider, a huge underground experimental facility for studying unknown subatomic particles.
About 150 people including scientists and Diet members attended a symposium marking the start of the bid for the International Linear Collider project in Tokyo on Thursday.
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said at the event that a particle collider has been used to study the origin of universe but that the technology also has applications in medicine and material development to enrich human life.
Japan hopes to build the collider inside a 30-kilometer tunnel.
The project would allow physicists to collide electrons and protons to find the Higgs boson and other unknown elementary particles.
The estimated 10-billion-dollar project is projected to be completed in the mid-2020s.
Japan has two candidate sites for the project -- one in the Sefuri mountain area of Kyushu in southwestern Japan, and the other in the Kitakami mountain region in northern Japan. Geological surveys of the sites are planned for next year as part of the bidding process, in which the United States and Switzerland are also taking part.
The head of the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization in Tsukuba, which is heading Japan`s bid, says a new collider is vital to learn more about physical phenomena and will help revitalize Japanese industry.
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