In five years physicists will switch on the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland and begin smashing protons with an energy not seen since a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang. The goal is to study the menagerie of particles that spew from the wreckage. But two physicists think black holes might also be produced.
Steven Giddings, from the University of California at Santa Barbara, and Scott Thomas, from Stanford, base their prediction on a speculative notion that space contains dimensions beyond the familiar three. These extra dimensions could extend a few thousandths of an inch—huge by subatomic standards—but would remain imperceptible under normal conditions. In a powerful particle accelerator, the additional dimensions could make themselves known by increasing the gravitational attraction between two colliding particles. Gravity grows stronger as two masses move closer together. In three dimensions, halving the distance quadruples the attraction. But for a particle existing ...
