

Ask HN: How do I get a job at the LHC? - Xcelerate

Hacker News is filled with a wide variety of people, so I am hoping someone on here might be able to help me out with regards to what the best route is for working at the large hadron collider.<p>I am a chemical engineering graduate student in the first year of my doctoral program.  I've already done research in molecular dynamics simulations in conjunction with the supercomputers at a national lab in the US.  I realize this is somewhat different than the work that most people do at the LHC, but there's always interesting niches that need to be filled.<p>My interests are more in the theoretical, physics-based side of chemical engineering instead of the engineering aspects, so a research career would be my best hope.<p>I will pursue the conventional means of trying to get a job at CERN, but as it seems like an incredibly exciting and unusual place, I am hoping that some folks on here may have some insight into a good route to get there.  Thanks!
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1rae
I got some feedback, I'm not sure how useful it would be, but the first option
is you could get a job position there, as you mentioned; or join a research
group.

It is apparently very difficult to get in by yourself, so you would have to
focus your research topic towards physics (not necessarily particle physics),
and work with a supervisor who is already working on research with the LHC.
You could check with your university physics department if they have an LHC
program, or you could ask your university to apply to join.

The other option, is to get involved in the programming and information
processing, the main language there is c++ with ROOT, my roommate is working
with atlas and programming at the moment; but as a contrast another one of my
friends is with new material development or testing for the accelerator and
sensor hardware.

Unfortunately they had no information specifically related to chemical
engineering opportunities.

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Xcelerate
Thanks for the feedback! I appreciate you asking your friends. I'm thinking my
best shot may be the programming route (post-processing results).

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1rae
All my friends are doing their Phd's and working with Cern, I'll ask them if
they might have any ideas for you once they wake up

