CERN Accelerating science

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Angels and Demons movie poster

In Ron Howard's Angels & Demons Tom Hanks plays Harvard academic Robert Langdon, who discovers evidence of the resurgence of an ancient secret brotherhood called the Illuminati - the most powerful underground organization in history.

When Langdon finds evidence that the Illuminati have stolen antimatter from a secret laboratory at CERN, which they plan to use as a devastating weapon to destroy the Vatican, he and CERN scientist Vittoria Vetra begin a race against time to recover the antimatter and prevent catastrophe.

But what is antimatter? Is is real? Is it dangerous? What is CERN?

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Frequently Asked Questions

What kind or research is undertaken at CERN? Who controls it? How is it funded?

It is very difficult to contain antimatter. Any contact between a particle and its anti-particle leads to their immediate annihilation...

When antimatter comes into contact with matter it annihilates: the mass of the particle and its antiparticle are converted into pure energy. But can this energy be harnessed in some useful way?