Second Place, 2014

Scientists trying to recreate an exotic state of matter believed to have existed just after the Big Bang will use the detector system containing the Muon Telescope Detector module (pictured here) to observe what happens when heavy ions collide at high speeds. The Muon module was assembled and tested by the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Physics Group at The University of Texas at Austin.

Credit:
Martin Codrington, Ph.D.
Relativistic Heavy-Ion Physics Group, Department of Physics