

Good-bye, Large Hadron Collider. Hello, Black Mesa.

That's the reader's choice in Wired Science's Large Hadron Collider Renaming Contest, announced last week to fill the vast gulf between the LHC's scientific magnificence and utterly wonky name.

Since then, an electrical problem has shuttered the mammoth atom smasher until 2009 – making Black Mesa, a reference to the bestselling computer game Half Life, a timely choice. It won't take long for delays and malfunctions to sour the public on their $8-billion Large Hadron Collider, but Black Mesa sounds scary and intimidating, like a leaked government project. Criticize it, and you'll end up on a watch list.

Black Mesa was submitted separately by Brian Reed and DSA. Finishing second was the Chuck Norris Roundhouse Kick Simulator, submitted by Anonymous. Among my favorite also-rans were Master Blaster Atom Smasher; Atom Smasher +5, Holy Avenger; What Willis Was Talking About; The Big Banger; and The Thing We Play With When We Aren't Playing Warcraft.

All these entries are better than the winner of the Royal Society of Chemistry's winner: Halo.

The least-favorite choice in our contest was The Blesser, submitted by Vincenzo Maggio. Its sheer unpopularity was likely due to its religious overtones, but at this point, the LHC can use a bit of help, divine or not.

See Also:

WiSci 2.0: Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook.