READ: CERN Goes Dark: The Large Hadron Collider Begins Its Biggest Transformation Yet

After more than a decade of groundbreaking experiments, CERN has officially powered down the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) as scientists begin an ambitious overhaul that will transform it into the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider (HL-LHC). While the shutdown marks the end of one chapter in modern physics, it also opens the door to a new era of even more powerful experiments—and, for some, even more questions.