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has a domed ceiling
like a mosque.  Here is where particle physicists are hoping and praying to
make our last few discoveries before we have to look for natural phenomenon to
answer questions about the ultimate building blocks of nature.”
    Oliver smiled at the good
humored jab at his religious metaphor of their scientific dedication.  He then
turned to David Benjamin and said, “David, you’re an astrophysicist.  How is
your research related to that of Khalil’s?”
    “What Khalil and the other
‘high energy physicists’ have discovered in building more and more powerful
atom smashers, is that mankind lacks both the money and the technology to go
any further than they have at CERN.  They’ll never be able to smash atoms or
pieces of atoms together with enough energy to reveal the most fundamental
pieces of matter, or the nature of the forces holding them together.”
    “Then what can astronomy
offer?”
    “We know from years of
astronomical observations that the universe is continually expanding and
cooling.  If it indeed started some thirteen billion years ago in a big bang,
then, in its first seconds of existence, pieces of atoms were smashing together
at energies greater than anything man can ever generate in the lab.”
    “So astronomy can see these
missing pieces of matter?”
    “No.  Unfortunately, the
universe was so hot in its early history light was unable to penetrate it.  The
oldest light we can see with our telescopes was generated hundreds of thousands
of years after the light produced by these exotic particles and forces.”
    “Then what new insight can
astrophysics provide concerning the nature of matter?”
    “With our latest telescopes
we are now looking for gravitational ripples, in this oldest light we can see,
that were produced when these exotic particles were first formed.”
    “I understand your telescope
is located at the South Pole.  Why place a telescope in such a hostile
environment?”
    “The South Pole is the best
place to study deep space.  I know this sounds silly, but the South Pole is
truly dark.  Now, not to be outdone by Khalil, my temple of research at the
South Pole has the most ominous name of the three.  It is called ‘The Dark Sector
Laboratory’: ‘Dark’, because during the southern winter this region is darker than
any other part of the earth, and therefore offers the cleanest window on the
universe.”
    “What have you seen at this
dark temple?”
    “We’ve recently found subtle evidence
of the very first forms of matter, created at the earliest moments of the
universe.  This new data has begun to draw in a third discipline at Fermilab,
that of mathematics and computer modeling.” said David, as he gestured toward
Elizabeth.
    Smiling, she then continued
the tutorial. “Here at your Fermilab ‘cathedral’, we theorists have been able
to group fundamental particles together in families based on shared
properties.  These families in turn show such well-defined patterns that we
have been able to identify undiscovered family members that properly fill in
the blank positions in the patterns.  Using their predicted properties, experimentalists
have then been able to find many of these missing family members. 
    “Merging these patterns of fundamental
particles together, using pure mathematics, has led to a unified theory of the
forces holding together these fundamental particles to form the various forms
of matter.  Now, to venture deeper into questions like how these fundamental
particles and forces came to be, this mathematical approach has begun to take
center stage and now seeks experimental data at CERN and the Dark Sector Lab,
to verify its final predictions.”
    “What kinds of pattern are
seen in the data?”
    “The tables of properties of
each family of particles actually appear as symmetrical patterns, some
hexagonal, some triangular.  That is why we had little trouble predicting the
properties of the missing members.  We believe we