The probability of finding new particles is growing as elementary particle physicists are gaining the ability to smash atoms together at incredibly high speeds. This is done in particle accelerators and supercolliders, which are large devices built to accelerate individual particles to almost the speed of light. The particles are then placed in line with other particles. Both outcomes can be studied to provide more insight into the realm of the infinitesimally small. This would be the furthest step ever taken by scientists, and the supercollider would have the capabilities of accelerating particles to faster speeds.
Protons are often the particles accelerated, because of their small mass and relative stability.
They are smashed into antiprotons, the particles with characteristics exactly opposite those of the proton. The second choice of particle physicists is the electron, being almost massless and easy to accelerate, smashing it into its opposite particle, the positron. All this accelerating and colliding was meant to prove the existence of some fundamental particle, something which was the building block of all matter and could not be divided. Several hundred new particles were found, most of which could only exist within the stability of the accelerator. Some physicists, though, likened the finding of this array of particles to unscientific studies.