Lyn explained his role in an interview for the BBC Wales Sci-Files website a few years ago.
"I'm responsible for a £1 billion project designing and building the world's biggest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), in a gigantic 27km-circumference, underground tunnel at CERN (The European Organization for Nuclear Research), near Geneva, Switzerland.
"I've been around a long time and seen big projects, but when I go into that tunnel I feel really overawed. Day to day I run a lab with two and a half thousand staff - which is huge.
"I also oversee the coordination between all the other organisations building components for the accelerator, another 200 to 300 scifiles and engineers worldwide.
"My job involves quite a bit of travel ... I met the President of China and thought to myself, not bad for a bloke from Aberdare!
"My biggest career hurdle was passing O Level French which was a requirement for university. It was a nightmare.
"Ironically, since joining CERN, I spend half of my time working in French."
After years of planning and construction, Lyn finally launched the LHC on 10 September 2008 with a click of his computer mouse.
Some had claimed the experiment could wreak disaster on the entire world.
But the physicist and project leader said beforehand: "Don't worry, there will not be a tsunami in Cardiff Bay."
The LHC, which Lyn called "a discovery machine, the most sophisticated scientific instrument of our time," will smash two beams of particles head-on at super-fast speeds, recreating the conditions in the Universe moments after the Big Bang.
Scientists hope to see new particles in the debris of these collisions, revealing fundamental new insights into the nature of the cosmos.
But there was an early glitch when a magnet failure forced scientists to shut the machine down barely a week after it started.
Lyn will be hoping the shutdown is only temporary - after almost four decades devoted to the research he is due to retire in 2009.
your comments
Richard Clarke from Minehead
Dr Evans' BBC interview was wonderfully clear. I'm sure the LHC is in good hands. But why oh why express the risk to the Earth (non-existent, I'm sure) in your piece in terms of a tsunami in Cardiff Bay when evidence for just such an event in 1607 is in print!(Bryant & Haslett, 2007, J. Geol. 115, 253-69)
Jeff Owen, Abercynon via Vancouver, Canada
Dr Evans, you should be Knighted and claim your rightful place at the head of the table with Einstein on your left and Hubble on your right. An amazing success story on the cutting edge of science, congratulations Dr Evans. "Art is subjective nonsense - Science is."
Nigel Jones, Pontyclun
Congrats to Lyn - I worked at CERN in the 80's for Rutherford Lab in Oxford, always enjoyed my time there working with all nationalities and suprisingly a lot of Welsh people, who also enjoyed the fact that there was a small Welsh community at CERN. Like most things in this world us Welsh are always there or thereabouts. CERN has a special part in my memories and it's so good to see something I was very proud to be part of getting some attention. All the best Lyn, and if you are looking for tickets for the 6 nations I may be able to help
Andrew Croal
Hi Lyn, Here is a poem I wrote about the LHC. Good luck with your challenges. I am sure it will eventually be worthwhile.
Ode to the ‘Large Hadron Collider’
Deep beneath the farms of France, physics takes a massive chance.
Europe’s best & brightest teams, focus up their narrow beams,
While gangs of dedicated geeks, tighten tubes & look for leaks.
Giant magnets, so it’s said, accelerate a proton thread, Until it hits the speed of light; - well, maybe not exactly quite.
But anyhow, extremely fast. The speed of light is unsurpassed.
When they’ve got sufficient spin, they’re whacked against their proton kin,
Spun from an opposing strand, swirled around from Switzerland,
All aligned with great precision, & smashed together in collision.
Then, whatever fragments found, fathom matters most profound
Like, What are mass and gravity, space and super-symmetry?
Dimensions deep & matter dark? What riddles lurk within the quark?
Is it worth the money spent, on this vast experiment?
Other questions, not as thrilling, strangely garner equal billing;
What if all this - just perhaps, precipitates a mass collapse?
Could the apparatus heave a hadron through Geneva? Could quantum spin & somersaults, zap the gold in Zurich’s vaults?
Sour the milk & spook the pigs? Just what if the Hunt for Higg’s Tolls our final self-destruction, or invites an alien abduction?
What would Isaac Newton think? Would he envisage Earth might sink?
Humanity, prosperity, down a singularity? For this we’ve waited many years,
To have a hadron smash, Boldly probing new frontiers, And spent a pile of cash.
Scientists seem unconcerned, proudly listing all they’ve learned
While their rivals gather traction, in ‘equal and opposing’ action.
Alas, no protons whizz around, and silent is the ring.
No hadrons thread the underground, at least until the spring.
Some free advice, on this device…while disappointment lingers.
Find that glitch & throw the switch! Be sure & cross your fingers!
Andrew Croal 13 November 2008
Christopher Williams from Newport
I am from Aberdare well done to the man. Somebody asked if Lyn Evans could see about building a road tunnel from the Rhondda to Aberdare. How about rebuilding the cross valley railway. Never happen I know. Well done to Lyn Evans.
Ronald Evans from Tenby
Congratulations Lyndon Evans - we Celts can still show the world that a small nation can still produce a great leader.
Gill Harrison, Pembrokeshire
Extremely proud that a fellow countryman has played such a prominent part in this monumental project. Well done Lyn!
Dr Gerald Hooper
I am sorry to learn that the LHC crashed but it does confirm my opinion that the UK has wasted its investment in this project when the experts located at the LHC can not even answer the simplest of questions about its operation. The fact is that there is a glaring anomaly that needs to be resolved between the speed of circulation of the BEAM around the perimeter of the LHC and the quoted speed of the PROTONS contained within the BEAM which in all your publicity publications are supposed to be travelling almost at the speed of light.
Stuart Williams from Plymouth
Is this the same Lyndon Evans who I went to school with? Cwmbach Primary and Aberdare Grammar School (and who always came top of the form!), whose mother used to collect for the Pru? Even if it's not, congratulations!
Gareth Jones, London
We must have had an awful French teacher! I was (I think) one year behind Lyn Evans at Aberdare Boys Grammar and similarly found French the biggest obstacle to my chosen career as a scientist. Unlike him I failed miserably, even after a resit. Nevertheless, I did end up at Univesity College London for my student days; not too bad for a failure!
Paul Hedditch, Tylorstown, Rhondda
Lyn, could you see about having a road tunnel beteen the Rhondda and Aberdare? Well done for putting Wales on the map.
Scientist running the world's biggest experiment
