Scientists are trying recreate conditions just after the Big Bang when the universe was born.

In a large collider which has been cooled to 271 degrees centigrade, particles will be made to collide at nearly the speed of light.

All of this will take place in a 27 kilometre long tunnel, 80 metres below the earth's surface.

The scientists are looking for a fundamental particle called Higgs Bozon. They are expecting data to be generated on particles and the radiation.

It is the most expensive experiment ever to be conducted.

One of the strongest critics of the CERN experiment is Profeessor Dr Otto E Rossler a German biochemist. In June this year in an open letter he strongly criticised the big bang experiment trying to raise awareness of the possiblity of creating human-made uncontrollable mini-holes.

"At the CERN a machine is built, with which the first time in the history of mankind black holes on earth could be produced. Nobody knows whether it goes. The probability lies about around the 10 per cent," Rossler said.

"I think it will be much more exciting if we don't find the Higgs. That will show something is wrong, and we need to think again. I have a bet of $100 that we won't find the Higgs." renowned physicist Stephen Hawking said.

India shines at CERN experiment
There was a rare access into the 27 kilometer long tunnel, situated 100 meters below the Earth's surface, where one of most ambitious physics experiment seeking to create the moments after the Big Bang will take place. Here's that report in which he also tells us of India's contribution to the experiment.

Beneath the breathtaking Alpine vineyards, work at a feverish pace to complete a machine nicknamed the "Lord of Rings" -- otherwise called a particle accelerator. It will be switched on next summer. What it's going to do is to recreate the birth of the universe, on a smaller scale, of course.
The experiment will be carried out deep inside the Earth in a circular tunnel 27 kilometres long, 100 metres below the surface of the Earth.

Scientists here hope to crash sub-atomic particles, whirring around at the speed of light. By monitoring the debris of these tiny crashes, they will work out the relationship between matter and energy and possibly learn more about how matter came into existence.

In this largely European experiment, India has provided about 40 million dollars worth of resources, including all the arms the particle accelerator sits on.

Dr V C Sahni, Director, Raja Ramanna Centre For Advanced Technology, Indore, says: "It is one of the large magnets, 15 meters long whose magnetic field testing was done by the Indian team. The objects that are sitting here they are essentially built by the Electronics Corporation of India Limited."

The entire Large Hadron Collider or LHC will be sitting on India made jacks, these objects weigh 32 tonnes and have to be located to the precision of a few tens of micron.

Indian scientists are highly regarded here, as are their contributions.

Prof Sukalyan Chattopadhyay, scientist, Saha Institute Of Nuclear Physics, adds: "This is an Indian detector as you see part of the di-muon spectrometer of Alice. It is fully made in India and on the detectors you see are the significant contributions from the Indian collaboration, which are these chips which are called MANAS chips and these chips are being utilized not only by the Indian scientists but also by scientists from France, Germany, Italy and Russia."

To remind the world of India's deep philosophical understanding of the universe, India donated CERN a giant bronze statue of Natraja -- Shiva performing his dance of cosmic creation and destruction.

Indians have provided more than a 100-man years of contribution to this exercise, and fabricated and shipped precision equipment giving the Indian tricolour a new pride of place.

John Ellis, physicist, European Organisation For Nuclear Research (CERN), Geneva, says: "We are very happy with the Indian participation in the LHC project. Indian physicists and engineers have made important contribution to the accelerator making magnets and testing the magnets.

In the ATLAS cavern 80 meters below the surface, everything is large. It is a 27 kilometer tunnel in which an experiment where 8000 scientists from the world are participating.

They are trying to re-create what happened in the first few seconds of the Big Bang. Hoping to find that elusive particle the Higgs-Boson. A particle they hope will show what matter is.