What would happen if you put your hand in the beam of the Large Hadron Collider, the high-energy particle accelerator being used in the search for the Higg's boson? Funny you should ask--even physicists have trouble with that one.
In 2010, a University of Nottingham video series known as Sixty Symbols posed the question to several of the university's physicists.
"Don't know, don't know, don't know," repeated Dr. Roger Bowley. His colleague Dr. Laurence Eaves responded with, "I, oh gosh, um..."
"I don't think you'll survive very much," suggested Dr. Ed Copeland. "I don't really know what will happen."
Maybe that's not an unreasonable answer. The beam of the huge collider, which straddles the border between France and Switzerland, measures less than 1 millimeter in diameter--but is made up of protons racing at 99.9 percent the speed of light (that's crazy energy).
Now Sixty Symbols is out with a new video (above) in which the "what would happen" question is posed to physicists who work at the LHC, part of the European Organization For Nuclear Research (CERN). In the video LHC researchers Dr. David Barney and Dr. Steven Goldfarb came up with answers.
Check out the video to hear their responses.