Two teams from Vanderbilt have joined in an international experiment that could prove the existence of black holes and dark matter. The experiments are being conducted at CERN lab on the border of Switzerland and France in the biggest particle accelerator in the world, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

The main job of the Vanderbilt team is to write and adapt computer code in order to provide an analysis of the particle collisions.

"Collisions happen (in the accelerator) ... at a high energy and stuff comes out. Our job is to take that stuff that comes out and work backwards ... to reconstruct what happened and to see if some new particle is being created," said Eduardo Luiggi, a doctoral student and member of the Vanderbilt Particle Physics department working with the LHC.

Researchers are hoping to use the LHC to prove physics theories essential to explaining how the universe functions.

"There are a few things we know. There is dark matter, it is present, but we don't have any idea what it is. At LHC, we hope to create it," said Professor of Physics Paul Sheldon. "We may produce miniature black holes that will evaporate away. These (black holes) can't be produced unless there are extra dimensions in space."

Even though Sheldon is excited about the potential creation of black holes, he is skeptical about the truth in the popular "doomsday" theory surrounding experiments at LHC.

"There is not enough energy in these collisions to create a black hole that would have enough mass to keep growing and take in half the earth," Sheldon said.

He said roughly 2000 researchers from institutions all over the world are working at CERN each day.

"Once you are onsite, you can meet someone from anywhere, every place around the world. It is a real international experience," said Andres Rojas, a second-year graduate student who spent the past summer at CERN.

"It is important to attract the best and brightest into science and that science is being done at universities instead of national labs," said Associate Professor of Physics Will Johns.

"If you have a good idea, Vanderbilt will help you find support for it ... Vandy does a good job of enabling good ideas and this kind of attitude makes this a great place for research," Sheldon said.