Since 2016, after Holland@CERN’s participation during that year, CERN has turned into a growing customer at Nijdra Group. Initially, it was about supplying parts but now, more and more use is made of Nijdra’s expertise. “On my most recent visit to CERN in Geneva, during which I spoke to several engineers and departments, I specifically drew attention to our specialist work in the fields of clean(room) production, vacuum, cryogenic and precision processing of exotic materials, presenting them by means of practical examples. The response was highly positive and immediately after that visit, we got involved in a number of development projects.” - says Dennis van Dijk, the General Manager of the Nijdra Group and still closely involved in the Sales department and New Business activities.
“Thanks to our proven track record, something we achieved within a reasonably short period of time by supplying complex parts, many parties within CERN are showing an interest. Despite the size of this organisation (with approximately 10,000 permanent members of staff, 6,500 of whom are scientists), everyone’s talking about our good name. That makes it a lot easier and it also means we meet up with the right people.” - Van Dijk continues.
At the moment, Nijdra is involved in the early stages of various projects at CERN, including the printing of components for magnets, superconductors, vacuum connections and cryostats made of titanium, stainless steel and non-oxygen copper.
CERN is a European organisation that conducts fundamental research into elementary particles. An elementary particle is a particle that cannot be split into other particles. The organisation is established in Meyrin, the Canton of Geneva, west of the city of Geneva, on the border between France and Switzerland.
CERN employs approximately 6,500 scientists who work on experiments in order to gain an insight into how matter is composed. What particles does the matter consist of and what are the forces that keep those particles together? The research is carried out by means of particle accelerators that make it possible to allow particles to collide with each other at great speed (almost the speed of light). During the collision, the particles disintegrate into elementary particles called quarks. This way, the scientists hope to find theories that can explain the four fundamental forces (electromagnetic force, gravity, weak nuclear forces and the strong nuclear forces) from a single elementary force.
The Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, the largest particle accelerator in the world, was taken into use in August 2008. However, after eight years of subatomic particles colliding with each other, it is now time to expand the LHC. This High-Luminosity project should be finished in 2026 and then go online. If all goes to plan, the collision percentage of the LHC (which lets subatomic particles collide with each other at almost the speed of light) will be increased by a factor seven, enabling the particle accelerator to collect up to ten times more data.
Also see: The road to High Luminosity.