Sydney, October 19 In a bizarre sci-fi theory, scientists have said that the Large Hadron Collider, which is the world's biggest atom smasher, could be jinxed by a future force to protect the world.

According to a report carried in www.news.com.au, the theory has been put forward by Danish physicist Dr Holger Bech Nielsen and Dr Masao Ninomiya from Japan.

They claim that the LHC startup has been delayed due to nature trying to prevent it from finding the elusive Higgs boson, or "God particle".

They say their maths proves that nature will "ripple backward through time" to stop the LHC before it can create the God particle, like a time traveller who goes back in time to kill his grandfather.

"One could even almost say that we have a model for God. He rather hates Higgs particles, and attempts to avoid them," said Dr Nielsen.

"While it is a paradox to go back in time and kill your grandfather, physicists agree there is no paradox if you go back in time and save him from being hit by a bus," said Dannis Overbye.

"In the case of the Higgs and the collider, it is as if something is going back in time to keep the universe from being hit by a bus," he added.

European science agency CERN designed the world's biggest particle accelerator to shoot beams around a freezing 27km concrete ring underground near Geneva, smashing atoms together in search of the elusive "God particle" which is believed to have been present at the Big Bang.

The multi-billion-dollar machine, built over almost 20 years, was set to launch in late 2008 but broke down after it overheated during a test run.

The relaunch was pushed back to late 2009 as more parts had to be replaced, and CERN was recently scandalized when a LHC scientist was found to have approached al-Qaeda for work.

The LHC is set to start up again next month. (ANI)