For better or for worse, the first particles have finally been injected into the world's largest atom smasher. Scientists at CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, will be observing the behavior of the first proton particles injected into the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) earlier this month.

This weekend hopes to study how the particles travel the whole way around the machine for the first time. Once the individual LHC detectors are ready, further injection tests will be conducted to ensure two counter-rotating proton beams can circulate throughout the machine.

Tests will continue all the way into September. The machine aims to achieve an optimal energy output of 5 TeV per beam by the end of 2008.

The machine hopes to improve on the current theory about the forces that bind together atom particles. The experiment also hopes to find the Higgs particle, which can supposedly explain why atoms contain particles that have weight.

Other theories may soon be brought to a new light after the LHC is switched on. One of these include the mysterious dark matter that can only be detected via gravitational forces that exerts itself on other particles.

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