GENEVA (AP) — The research center that is home to the world’s largest particle accelerator is celebrating its 70th anniversary on Tuesday, with the physicists who run it aiming to unlock secrets about dark matter and other mysteries to promote science for peace in today’s conflict-darkened world.Over the last seven decades, CERN, the sprawling research center on the Swiss-French border at Geneva, has become a household name in Europe, the West and beyond, but its complex inner workings remain a puzzle to many people.Here’s a look at CERN and how its discoveries have changed the world and our view of the universe — and could change them more in coming years.What is CERN?The European Organization for Nuclear Research, which has retained the French-language acronym CERN for its predecessor outfit, had its origins in a 1951 meeting of the U.N.’s scientific organization that sought to build a state-of-the-art physics research facility in Europe and ease a brain drain toward America after World War II. Groundbreaking was on May 17, 1954.Today, for cognoscenti, CERN is probably best known as home to the Large Hadron Collider, trumpeted as the world’s biggest machine, which powers a network of magnets to accelerate particles through a 27-kilometer (17-mile) underground loo …
