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Posted on 05/09/2025 1:44:01 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Scientists at CERN have turned lead into gold during high-speed experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), achieving a phenomenon once confined to ancient legend.
The findings, published by the ALICE collaboration in Physical Review Journals, confirm that gold atoms can form under extreme conditions created during heavy-ion collisions at the LHC. While the transformation is temporary and cannot be harnessed for practical use, it marks a major scientific milestone.
For centuries, alchemists have attempted to turn common metals into gold. This concept, once dismissed as pseudoscience, has now gained experimental footing. Researchers achieved the result by accelerating lead nuclei to nearly the speed of light. As the nuclei passed each other without direct contact, they generated powerful electromagnetic fields.
Rare collisions trigger a subatomic chain reaction
These fields triggered a rare event known as an ultra-peripheral collision, producing intense bursts of energy. The energy briefly disrupted the internal structure of the lead atoms, knocking out protons and neutrons. In rare cases, the lead nuclei lost exactly three protons, changing their atomic identity from lead (82 protons) to gold (79 protons).
Though the process had been theorized before, it had never been measured so precisely. The breakthrough came through using specialized sensors called Zero Degree Calorimeters, part of the ALICE experiment.
Grecian Delight supports Greece
These detectors tracked events where lead nuclei emitted up to three protons and at least one neutron, signaling the possible formation of new elements, including gold.
The ALICE team said gold production was the rarest outcome among various newly formed elements, but still measurable. At peak conditions, about 89,000 gold atoms were created every second during collisions. However, the atoms emerged with such high energy that they immediately collided with the collider’s inner walls, breaking apart almost instantly into smaller particles.
Gold exists for only a split second
Between 2015 and 2018, during the LHC’s second run, researchers estimated the creation of roughly 86 billion gold atoms. Yet the total mass amounted to only 29 picograms—about 30 million times lighter than a grain of dust. Even with improved production in the collider’s current phase, the total volume remains scientifically interesting but practically negligible.
“It’s impressive to see how our detectors can record head-on collisions that generate thousands of particles, and at the same time be sensitive enough to detect events where only a few particles are involved,” said ALICE spokesperson Marco Van Leeuwen.
ALICE team member Uliana Dmitrieva credited the success to the precision of the calorimeters. Physicist John Jowett noted that the results offer valuable insight into particle beam behavior, helping researchers improve future accelerator designs and safety systems.
While no gold can be collected, the experiment offers a rare glimpse into the power of modern physics—and a nod to one of humanity’s oldest dreams.
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The Philosopher’s Stone.
We spent $5 billion building it and it produced less than a speck of gold. Got a long way to go to make it cost effective.
Who spent $5 billion building it?
Gold is only one valence electron away from lead.
If only ancient alchemists had known that all you need is a particle accelerator 27 miles long.
By we, I meant the organization that built it, mostly Europe but the US contributed at least $531 million toward it.
https://ssti.org/blog/us-completes-531m-contribution-large-hadron-collider-project
They say they can do it, but it is a darned awful expensive way to “mine” gold.
Cheaper to snag gold off passing asteroids. Or open up the mountain ranges in California.
Are they the ones creating portals to other dimensions?
Lol.
I thought this stunt was done in the 50’s.
Glenn Seaborg, 1951 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, succeeded in transmuting a minute quantity of lead, (possibly en route from bismuth) in 1980 into gold. The experiment was carried out, running particle beams through the Bevalac that took about about $5,000 an hour in costs to run. “It would cost more than 1,000,000,000,000,000 dollars per ounce to produce gold by this experiment,” Seaborg told the Associated Press that year. The going rate for an ounce of gold at the time? About $560.
That would be Black Mesa, and let’s just say there were unforeseen consequences.
They are not saying which isotope was created.
Sounds like it is NOT Au 197
“That would be Black Mesa, and let’s just say there were unforeseen consequences.”
- - - - - - - -
Hmm. Black Mesa. Have not heard that one.
Details? Anything resembling USS Philadelphia? . . .
Maybe save money by finding a guy named rumplestilskin and give him a big stack of hay?
Glenn Seaborg. Most people never heard of him but he was a genuine American alchemist. He created most of the elements past Uranium. He also made Gold just to say he did that too.
It’s a reference to the game Half Life, but in that universe there is a ship like the Philadelphia, the Borealis.
Geneva has a lab named cern with money to burn
Working on the impossible dream
They work night and day with no time to play
but not all’s like it seems
I’ve been told on a story quite old
they have it in their head
they can make gold from the lead
but I’m not quite sold
They shoot a neutron beam
and let it sorta careen
As it sped it hit the lead
and then it split the scene
it made some gold is the story they told
but split up after hitting the walls
with nothing to show but a big gaping hole
with billions all gone who makes the calls
Thank you for the information.
You beat me to it, and with more details than I could have given off the top of my head. But I remembered that from when it was first in the news.
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