Category: Archve

Conferences are a great way to promote international scientific communication, and CERN soon acquired considerable experience in running them. In January 1961 it set up a Scientific Conference Secretariat to share this expertise, organizing conferences in collaboration with local scientific institutions abroad as well as those on-site. In the early days the Secretariat had a

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In his seasonal greetings to CERN’s Director-General and staff, the President of the CERN Council acknowledged the difficulties faced by a young organization and the devotion shown by all those involved in overcoming them. The reply, sent a few days later, emphasized how much had been achieved: “…Less than three months after its official birth,

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A telegram from Jean Mussard informed Edoardo Amaldi (Secretary-General of the provisional CERN) that the CERN Convention had finally come into force on 29 September, when France and Germany deposited their instruments of ratification at UNESCO House in Paris. Three more member states were yet to ratify – this took another five months – but

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CERN is a centre for scientific research, but also a place for exchanges between science and other fields of human culture and understanding. The visit of His Holiness the Dalai Lama on 30 August 1983 provided just such an opportunity. In the morning he and his delegation of monks toured some of CERN’s facilities, including

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When the CERN Convention was signed in 1953, it was assumed that the long-awaited European laboratory would soon become a reality. But ratification formalities took longer than expected. Meanwhile work on the ground was forging ahead, so it was a relief for the interim governors when the new CERN Council finally took office some 15

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“On this tenth day of June, one thousand nine hundred and fifty five, on ground generously given by the Republic and Canton of Geneva, was laid the foundation stone of the buildings of the headquarters and the laboratories of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, the first European institution devoted to co-operative research for the

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After long months of negotiation – success! The work of the provisional Council responsible for planning the new international laboratory for nuclear physics reached a successful conclusion on 1 July 1953 with the signature of the CERN Convention. The drafting committee and the administrative and financial working group had worked at UNESCO House throughout the

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A buzz of excitement marked the start of neutrino experiments at CERN in 1963. As many years of hard work were about to be put to the test, this spoof advertisement appeared on the concrete shielding near the heavy liquid bubble chamber. CERN inventions such as the fast ejection system, proposed in 1959 by Berend

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If you were one of the estimated 70,000 visitors to CERN during the 2013 Open Days – or one of the 2,000+ volunteers busily organizing visits, games and all manner of weird and wonderful activities – you might not recognize this photo! Fifty years ago CERN’s Open Days were conducted on a much more modest

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