Light takes three yoctoseconds to cross a proton. This tiny time is enough for heavy ion collisions at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Here quarks and gluons interact amongst themselves and form the quark gluon plasma that permeated the entire Universe microseconds after the Big Bang.

Studies show the plasma is formed during the first 5 yoctoseconds after elementary particle collisions. Little is known about this plasma formation. The EU-funded YoctoLHC project will use highly energetic particle jets to build a time image of the first 10 yoctoseconds after the collision. Project results will shed light on this complexity arising from the most fundamental particles existing in nature.