The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is located at the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN) near Geneva, Switzerland. Currently in the final stage of commissioning (2008), it will be the most powerful particle physics instrument in the world. It consists of two rings in which two counterrotating beams of hadrons (protons) are accelerated to an energy of 7 teraelectronvolts (1 TeV = 10¹² eV) and brought into collision at four points around the ring containing particle detectors. The center-of-mass energy of 14 TeV will be more than seven times larger than the energy achieved in the currently operating Tevatron at Fermilab near Chicago.