Scientists working at the world’s biggest atom smasher plan to announce tomorrow that they have gathered enough evidence to show that the long-sought ‘God particle’ answering fundamental questions about the universe almost certainly does exist.

The world’s largest atom smasher has used its accelerator for the first time to speed up the proton beams in an initial test of its ability to reach much higher energy later, a spokesman said today.

Scientists switched on the world’s largest atom smasher for the first time since the $10bn (€6.7bn) machine suffered a spectacular failure more than a year ago.

IT HAS been called an Alice-in-Wonderland investigation into the makeup of the universe — or dangerous tampering with nature that could spell doomsday.