Power failure trips up supercollider

GENEVA, Switzerland, Sept. 19 (UPI) -- A power failure shut down the powerful Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator earlier this week, scientists at the Swiss facility said.

A power interruption in the transformer affected the European Center for Particle Physics' refrigeration plant, meaning protons couldn't be beamed around the facility, Swissinfo.com reported Friday.

The collider ring must be minus 456.34 degrees F to allow protons to travel at more than 99.99 percent of the speed of light, scientists said.

Officials at the facility said the problem has been corrected and the refrigeration chamber was being cooled. They couldn't say when the beaming would resume, Swissinfo.com said.

The experiment seeks to recreate conditions one-trillionth of a second after the Big Bang to help scientists understand how the universe formed. The underground machine spans the Swiss-French border.