China’s Circular Electron Positron Accelerator Sparks Controversy Among Scientists Worldwide

The proposed circular electron positron accelerator (CEPC) in China has sparked controversy within the country’s scientific community. While it would far exceed the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), some scientists have expressed concerns about its construction cost of over 5 billion USD.

Despite these concerns, Nobel laureate Yang Chen-ning has been a vocal opponent of the CEPC, citing more pressing issues such as economic development and environmental protection. However, Eliezer Rabinovici, a professor emeritus of physics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and president of CERN, believes that Chinese scientists have the capacity to build the largest particle accelerator on Earth.

The debate over whether China should build the world’s largest particle accelerator has been ongoing for nearly a decade. Wang Yifang, director of IHEP, proposed the CEPC project in 2012 following the discovery of the Higgs boson in Europe. If approved, construction of the CEPC could begin within the next three years, pending government licenses and funding. Despite this controversy surrounding the project, many international physicists have recognized its potential impact on scientific research globally.