Tech Billionaires Back $1 Billion for CERN’s Next Physics Breakthrough
A part of complex Large Hadron Collider underground at the CERN particle physics research facility in Meyrin, Switzerland.
Photographer: Ronald Patrick/Getty ImagesSome of the wealthiest individuals in technology including Eric Schmidt and France’s Xavier Niel have pledged as much as €860 million ($1 billion) to CERN to fund a proposed successor to the Large Hadron Collider, as the storied research institute turns to private backers for the first time for future breakthroughs.
Switzerland-based CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, has lined up donors to help fund the proposed Future Circular Collider, a replacement for its famed particle accelerator on the French–Swiss border, the institute said Thursday. The Large Hadron Collider is a 16.8-mile underground ring that smashes protons at near light speed to advance fundamental physics research. It is currently the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator, and is famed for the discovery of the Higgs boson particle in 2012.