The CERN logo, representing the European Organization for Nuclear Research, combines the name with interlaced rings and straight lines extending beyond them. The rings are a simplified representation of the accelerator chain and particle tracks. The lettering and graphic form a single mark with fixed proportions. The main outline version is blue, with black and white alternatives for other settings. A version on a circular blue background is also available. The acronym comes from Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire, the French name of the European Council for Nuclear Research that preceded the organization.
CERN was founded in 1954 as a joint European scientific project. Its laboratory is near Geneva, straddling the border between Switzerland and France. The organization studies particle physics: accelerators bring particle beams to high energies, while detectors record the results of collisions. CERN’s best-known facility is the Large Hadron Collider, with an underground ring 27 kilometres in circumference. Experiments there investigate the structure of matter and fundamental interactions. In 2012, the ATLAS and CMS collaborations announced the discovery of a particle consistent with the Higgs boson. CERN was also the birthplace of the World Wide Web, originally developed to share information among scientists.
