Celebrated CERN Physicist Opens New Science labs

One of Swansea University’s most distinguished graduates returned to his alma mater in September to open a newly refurbished £3million suite of laboratories and teaching rooms In the University’s College of Science.

Professor Lyn Evans CBE FRS, who led the international project to build the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, graduated from Swansea University with a first class degree in Physics in 1966 and his PhD in 1970.

As Project Leader of the LHC at CERN – the European Organisation for Nuclear Research – he was at the centre of operations during the construction and commissioning stage, through to the LHC’s start-up on September 10, 2008.

Professor Evans, who was made an Honorary Fellow of the University in 2002, said:

“It is an honour to be asked to open the College’s new laboratories and teaching facilities, at the University where I myself studied as an undergraduate student and began my own physics research and career path – a path which eventually led me to CERN and the opportunity to work on one of the world’s largest and most exciting experiments with the LHC.

“I sincerely hope this investment in the learning and teaching of Swansea’s current and future physicists will reap great rewards.”

The laboratories and teaching rooms’ refurbishment was made possible through the University’s capital programme, the College of Science, and a generous bequest of £125K made to the Physics Department by Dr Gething Morgan Lewis FRSE, an eminent physicist who grew up in Ystalyfera in the Swansea Valley and was educated at Brecon College.