2000: The final curtain falls on LEP

In 2000, CERN brought to an end one of the most successful eras of its history when it switched off the Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP) in November.

Originally scheduled to close in 1999, LEP’s 2000 run was an added bonus for particle physics. The accelerator and experimental teams started the year determined that LEP would go out with a bang and not a whimper.

By the scheduled shutdown date at the end of September, the accelerator team had pushed LEP’s collision energies to hitherto undreamed of heights, and the experiments were reporting hints of something new.

After extending the run as far as possible without compromising the construction schedule for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the hints were as strong as ever, offering the promise of a rich seam of new physics for CERN’s next generation of experiments to tap into.