Apps for Everything Dept.: Blowing Things Up For Fun and Knowledge

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For anyone who likes a good explosion, whether it be a cement mixer blasted into vapor or protons crunched together in head-on collisions at nearly the speed of light, there are of course iPad apps.

For the large-scale blasts, Discover Channel's Mythbusters episodes fill the bill, and there is an app to bring the explosions to your iPad.

But for the biggest Big Bang of them all—the one scientists suspect started our universe—turn to the scientists at CERN, near Geneva, Switzerland. The LHC Dashboard app lets you watch the instruments live. 

The scientists are looking for clues to the origins of our universe and its fundamental operations. On a controversial multi-billion-dollar 18-mile circular track in a tube, particles are pushed toward the speed of light for head on collisions.

Before the Large Hadron Collider was originally fired up, fears made the rounds in the media that recreating the Big Bang might trigger a New Big Bang, tumbling the universe to places we don't want to go.  For a serious and detailed look at those concerns, there is No Canary in the Quanta, in the Kindle Store for $4.99.

And at 99 cents, the LHC Dashboard is for people who know their particle physics, uber-geeks, and desperate speed daters looking for connections with someone they want to impress. For the latter, load up your mental data banks from yesterday's story in the New York Times. 

But there's plenty of time to study:  The Large Hadron Collider goes on extended Christmas holiday starting tomorrow, Nov. 2.