Fermi Lab’s particle accelerator, previously the largest particle accelerator in the world, was shut down today.

the Tevatron is where the top quark was discovered — confirming scientists’ predictions about the fundamental nature of matter. And the technology inside this machine laid the foundation for an even bigger and more powerful particle collider that’s just fired up in Europe, the Large Hadron Collider.

The Large Hadron Collider is what finally made the Tevatron obsolete.