The science behind LHCb

Located in a vast underground cavern, 100 metres beneath the French countryside, LHCb is one of four large experiments based at the CERN laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland. The experiment, which involves about 700 scientists from 52 institutions around the world, has recorded the particles produced by the first circulating LHC proton beam on September 10th, 2008, and will run for at least 10 years.

The following pages explore the main ideas behind work at the LHCb.