The latest iteration of the world’s biggest physics experiment, the Large Hadron Collider, will be switched on in May 2008 (though the BBC documentary below says November, the time line has been updated).
It’s big, REALLY big, and expensive—costing over 6 billion dollars and crossing between the borders of France and Switzerland at four points. The LHC is being funded and built in collaboration with over two thousand physicists from thirty-four countries, universities and laboratories.
As a side note, CERN has had some impressive byproducts, including the web itself.
The BBC created a great documentary about it called The Six Billion Dollar Experiment, the full running time is 49 minutes, but you can enjoy the BBC’s preview:
[The Six Billion Dollar Experiment – YouTube]