The Asian nation is spending big in the hope of winning a Nobel prize, but it will need more than cash to realize its ambitions.
- Mark Zastrow 01 June 2016 Corrected: 03 June 2016
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Shin Woong-Jae A prototype axion detector in Daejeon, South Korea.
nature – Behind the doors of a drab brick building in Daejeon, South Korea, a major experiment is slowly taking shape. Much of the first-floor lab space is under construction, and one glass door, taped shut, leads directly to a pit in the ground. But at the end of the hall, in a pristine lab, sits a gleaming cylindrical apparatus of copper and gold. It’s a prototype of a device that might one day answer a major mystery about the Universe by detecting a particle called the axion — a possible component of dark matter.