Big science is a term used by
scientists and
historians of science to describe a series of changes in
science which occurred in
industrial nations during and after
World War II, as scientific progress increasingly came to rely on large-scale projects usually funded by national governments or groups of governments. Individual or small group efforts, or
Small Science, is still relevant today as theoretical results by individual authors may have a significant impact, but very often the empirical verification requires experiments using constructions, such as the
Large Hadron Collider, costing between $5 and $10 billion.