Brief
CERN physicists create trace amounts of gold by colliding lead nuclei
The ALICE team at the Large Hadron Collider observed tiny gold fragments after near‑miss collisions of lead nuclei, confirming a method of transmuting lead into gold.
By Felo News Desk · Published
Physicists working on the ALICE experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider reported that high‑speed collisions of lead nuclei have produced minute quantities of gold, amounting to roughly 29 trillionths of a gram.
What happened
In the ALICE detector, researchers fired beams of lead nuclei at each other at speeds approaching the speed of light. While direct, head‑on collisions destroy the nuclei, the more common near‑miss interactions generate an intense, short‑range electric field between the grazing nuclei. This field can cause the nuclei to vibrate and occasionally eject protons. When exactly three protons are stripped from a lead nucleus, the remaining nucleus becomes a gold atom.
What the reports add
The Independent explained that the experiment uses specialised zero‑degree calorimeters to count the protons that are removed during these near‑miss events, allowing scientists to confirm the creation of gold atoms. It also noted that the amount of gold produced is extraordinarily small—about 29 × 10⁻¹² g—highlighting the difficulty of scaling the process.
What was said
The article quoted a University of Seville source stating that “lead and gold are different elements, with three protons’ difference between them,” and described the electric field required to pull protons as “about a million times stronger than the electric fields that create lightning bolts in the atmosphere.”
How it came about
The discovery stems from attempts to recreate conditions just after the Big Bang, where particles collided at extreme energies. By using the LHC’s ALICE experiment to smash lead nuclei together, researchers unintentionally observed the transmutation of lead into gold, a phenomenon long imagined by medieval alchemists but only now demonstrated in a laboratory setting.
Key facts
- ALICE experiment at CERN produced about 29 trillionths of a gram of gold. (independent.co.uk)
- Gold atoms formed when lead nuclei lost exactly three protons during near‑miss collisions. (independent.co.uk)
- Zero‑degree calorimeters were used to count stripped protons and confirm gold creation. (independent.co.uk)
Sources
- [1] independent.co.uk — originally reported as “Scientists mimicking the Big Bang accidentally turn lead into gold”
