Higgs Boson - up to the teeth :-)
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Higgs Boson - up to the teeth :-)
Hello everyone,
I wish to start a new thread about latest developments in the world of
Physics and here's my hesitant attempt.
If, for whatever reason, you think this thread is misplaced, please
feel free to move or delete. Thank you so much
I wish to start a new thread about latest developments in the world of
Physics and here's my hesitant attempt.
If, for whatever reason, you think this thread is misplaced, please
feel free to move or delete. Thank you so much
True friendship is based on trust, honesty and sincere generosity of our hearts
The Higgs Boson by Derek Robins , a practical paper summarizing what we know and
want to know about Higgs particle in the context of some current topics of the science
of Physics.
want to know about Higgs particle in the context of some current topics of the science
of Physics.
True friendship is based on trust, honesty and sincere generosity of our hearts
And here's another beautiful introduction to what is happening today in the world of particle physics. I've taken this summary from the website HyperPhysics. and Wikipedia
All the known forces in the universe are manifestations of four fundamental forces, the strong, electromagnetic, weak, and gravitational forces. But why four? Why not just one master force? Those who joined the quest for a single unified master force declared that the first step toward unification had been achieved with the discovery of the discovery of the W and Z particles, the intermediate vector bosons, in 1983. This brought experimental verification of particles whose prediction had already contributed to the Nobel prize awarded to Weinberg, Salam, and Glashow in 1979. Combining the weak and electromagnetic forces into a unified "electroweak" force, these great advances in both theory and experiment provide encouragement for moving on to the next step, the "grand unification" necessary to include the strong interaction.
While electroweak unification was hailed as a great step forward, there remained a major conceptual problem. If the weak and electromagnetic forces are part of the same electroweak force, why is it that the exchange particle for the electromagnetic interaction, the photon, is massless while the W and Z have masses more than 80 times that of a proton! The electromagnetic and weak forces certainly do not look the same in the present low temperature universe, so there must have been some kind of spontaneous symmetry breaking as the hot universe cooled enough that particle energies dropped below 100 GeV. The theories attribute the symmetry-breaking to a field called the Higgs field, and it requires a new boson, the Higgs boson, to mediate it.
Early formulation of the theories estimated that the Higgs boson would have mass energy in excess of 1 TeV, making the energies for discovery almost unattainable on the earth. Now, since the discovery of the top quark, there is tantalizing evidence that the Higgs boson may have energies in the range of a few hundred GeV and therefore within the range of present day accelerators. At Fermilab, data from the D0 detector facility is used with the masses of the W and the T quark to estimate the mass of the Higgs boson. Suggestions that it may have a mass below 200 GeV have made it one of the high priorities for high energy physics.
Searching for the Higgs boson is one of the high priority objectives of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.
On 4 July 2012, the CMS and the ATLAS experimental teams at the Large Hadron Collider independently announced that they each confirmed the formal discovery of a previously unknown boson of mass between 125–127 GeV/c2, whose behaviour so far was "consistent with" a Higgs boson, while adding a cautious note that further data and analysis were needed before positively identifying the new boson beyond doubt as being a Higgs boson of some type.
Sources: HyperPhysics and Wikipedia
All the known forces in the universe are manifestations of four fundamental forces, the strong, electromagnetic, weak, and gravitational forces. But why four? Why not just one master force? Those who joined the quest for a single unified master force declared that the first step toward unification had been achieved with the discovery of the discovery of the W and Z particles, the intermediate vector bosons, in 1983. This brought experimental verification of particles whose prediction had already contributed to the Nobel prize awarded to Weinberg, Salam, and Glashow in 1979. Combining the weak and electromagnetic forces into a unified "electroweak" force, these great advances in both theory and experiment provide encouragement for moving on to the next step, the "grand unification" necessary to include the strong interaction.
While electroweak unification was hailed as a great step forward, there remained a major conceptual problem. If the weak and electromagnetic forces are part of the same electroweak force, why is it that the exchange particle for the electromagnetic interaction, the photon, is massless while the W and Z have masses more than 80 times that of a proton! The electromagnetic and weak forces certainly do not look the same in the present low temperature universe, so there must have been some kind of spontaneous symmetry breaking as the hot universe cooled enough that particle energies dropped below 100 GeV. The theories attribute the symmetry-breaking to a field called the Higgs field, and it requires a new boson, the Higgs boson, to mediate it.
Early formulation of the theories estimated that the Higgs boson would have mass energy in excess of 1 TeV, making the energies for discovery almost unattainable on the earth. Now, since the discovery of the top quark, there is tantalizing evidence that the Higgs boson may have energies in the range of a few hundred GeV and therefore within the range of present day accelerators. At Fermilab, data from the D0 detector facility is used with the masses of the W and the T quark to estimate the mass of the Higgs boson. Suggestions that it may have a mass below 200 GeV have made it one of the high priorities for high energy physics.
Searching for the Higgs boson is one of the high priority objectives of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.
On 4 July 2012, the CMS and the ATLAS experimental teams at the Large Hadron Collider independently announced that they each confirmed the formal discovery of a previously unknown boson of mass between 125–127 GeV/c2, whose behaviour so far was "consistent with" a Higgs boson, while adding a cautious note that further data and analysis were needed before positively identifying the new boson beyond doubt as being a Higgs boson of some type.
Sources: HyperPhysics and Wikipedia
Last edited by Nermin on Sun Jul 15, 2012 5:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
True friendship is based on trust, honesty and sincere generosity of our hearts
Well, all I know is that this new 'Higgsteria' made me succumb to my old addiction once more; reading New Scientist cover to cover.
'A fish popped out of the water only to be recaptured again. It is as I, a slave to all yet free of everything.'
http://evinnra-evinnra.blogspot.com
http://evinnra-evinnra.blogspot.com
Aniela Jaffé, Man & His Symbols,The parallelism between nuclear physics and the psychology of the collective
unconscious was often a subject of discussion between J u n g and Wolfgang Pauli,
the Nobel prizewinner in physics.
The space-time continuum of physics and the collective unconscious can be seen,
so to speak, as the outer and inner aspects of one and the same reality behind appearances.
(A book published in 1964, the very year Peter Higgs along with five others first
proposed the mechanism that suggested the presence of a such particle)
(The relationship between physics and psychology is discussed in detail by
Marie Louise von Franz in the final chapter of the same book entitled ‘Science
and the Unconscious’)
Isn't that the same reciprocity that Joseph Campbell is also implying
when talking about the 'Inner Shores of Outer Space'
True friendship is based on trust, honesty and sincere generosity of our hearts
At this age, most information is available to people like you and i
-all thanks to Internet. Yet, an effective ‘reference system’ is equally
important for elaborate reasoning without getting lost in the forest.
Joseph Campbell provides this system of reference and this perspective
to ordinary people and opens all the doors to those who are not tired of
seeking and asking questions.
That's the main reason I like these coolish forums and feel truly privileged
to be an associate no matter what’s the next frontier - outer space or particle physics
-all thanks to Internet. Yet, an effective ‘reference system’ is equally
important for elaborate reasoning without getting lost in the forest.
Joseph Campbell provides this system of reference and this perspective
to ordinary people and opens all the doors to those who are not tired of
seeking and asking questions.
That's the main reason I like these coolish forums and feel truly privileged
to be an associate no matter what’s the next frontier - outer space or particle physics
True friendship is based on trust, honesty and sincere generosity of our hearts