World famous scientists are in Malta to discuss the technical upgrading of the Large Hadron Collider, dubbed the biggest scientific experiment undertaken by human kind.

The €6.5 billion machine is a 27-kilometre tunnel that accelerates particles up to incredible speeds to understand the physics of their collision. The results of these studies could potentially address the most fundamental questions of physics and advance man’s understanding of the deepest laws of nature, according to the scientists working on it.

For the first time since it was built 26 years ago, 50 scientists got together at the Bighi headquarters of the Malta Council for Science and Technology to officially discuss the technical upgrade for this marvel of science. The chairman of MCST is Nicholas Sammut, who was a research scientist on the collider, located in Geneva.

Dr Sammut said the upgrade was a 10-year project that needed to be planned well in advance in the long term strategy of the instrument’s foreseen operational lifetime. “Eventually we will have to see what has to be upgraded and when but it’s still in the very early stages,” he said.

The three-day symposium, which will wrap up tomorrow, is being held in Malta as a member of the EU-Card consortium, an EU funded project. “We offered to host the meeting in Malta and the consortium accepted,” he said.

Two years ago, the particle accelerator was used in the so-called Big Bang experiment in which scientists are trying to recreate an explosion similar, albeit smaller in scale, to that which created the universe. “The experiment, which started two years ago, was much better than we expected,” Dr Sammut said.