On October 19, 1991, at 6:50 p.m., Bjørn Wiik logged the first collisions in the new electron-proton particle collider at the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron in Hamburg.
Laughter punctuates the excited conversations, a mix of German and English. Drinks are passed around and children dart among the legs of the hundred or so scientists gathered together for one last time. The sky’s blue is deepening: only 90 minutes until sunset.
What is the universe made of? What are matter, energy, space, and time? How did we get here and where are we going? In particle physics, the classic place to look for answers is in giant accelerators where particles collide. But nature also provides a wealth of data.
As technology evolves, posters are getting easier to produce and pass around. But it still takes skill and imagination to illustrate the abstract ideas of physics.
To artist and engineer Amy Lee Segami, water is no ordinary substance—it is her canvas. Using her knowledge of fluid mechanics, Segami paints on water in a contemporary version of the ancient Asian art form of Suminagashi.
