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Subscribe to RSSFermilab scientist Don Lincoln describes the nature of the Higgs boson.
Updated 9:50 a.m. ET Dec. 13:
Physicists have revealed what they've found so far in their quest for the Higgs boson at Europe's Large Hadron Collider on Tuesday, after days of buildup that put the "God particle" on a par with Obi-Wan Kenobi and the Force. But the Higgs boson isn't a religious experience, and it won't help you destroy the Death Star. So what is the Higgs? And what do scientists know about it? Here's a small guide to the Large Hadron Collider's latest:
Why it's important: For decades, physicists have used a theory known as the Standard Model to explain the interactions of subatomic particles, and the theory works beautifully. It's guided our way through the world of nuclear power, television, microwave ovens and lasers. One problem: The theory needed something extra to explain why some particles have mass and some don't. Back in the 1960s, physicist Peter Higgs and his colleagues proposed the existence of a mysterious energy field that interacts with some particles more than others, resulting in varying values for particle mass. That field is known as the Higgs field, and it's associated with a particle called the Higgs boson.
Today, the Higgs boson is the last fundamental piece missing from the Standard Model. Finding it is the most commonly cited reason for building the $10 billion LHC. If the characteristics of the Higgs particle (or particles) match what's predicted by the current formulation of the Standard Model, that would bring a sense of completion to particle physics. If the Higgs isn't found, that might force physicists to tweak or even discard the Standard Model. "I find it difficult to imagine how the theory works without it," Peter Higgs recently told the London monthly Prospect. If a non-Standard Higgs is detected, that could totally change the way we see the universe. In the far future, we might even find a way to take advantage of the Higgs field, just as earlier physicists took advantage of the electromagnetic field, radioactivity or quantum effects.
Where they're at: The quest for the Higgs is being conducted using two detectors at the LHC, which is housed at Europe's CERN particle physics center on the French-Swiss border. The collider has been built inside a 17-mile-round (27-kilometer-round) underground tunnel where two beams of protons are smashed together at 99.999999 percent of the speed of light.
The detectors, known as ATLAS (A Toroidal LHC ApparatuS) and CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid), are placed at key points on the collider ring. They're built somewhat differently, and they serve as a system of checks and balances to make sure one team can confirm what the other team is seeing. The LHC is the only collider on earth that can achieve the energies required to probe the Higgs boson's potential hiding places. (However, higher energies have been observed in cosmic ray collisions high above Earth's surface.)
CERN
This graphic shows a typical candidate event in the search for the Higgs boson, including two high-energy photons whose energy (depicted by red towers) has been measured in the CMS electromagnetic calorimeter. The yellow lines are the measured tracks of other particles produced in the collision.
What they've learned: The ATLAS and CMS teams shared their results in a series of public presentations at CERN, beginning at 8 a.m. ET Tuesday. Aidan Randle-Condle has been liveblogging the event at the Quantum Diaries blog. You'll find a less geeky liveblog at The Guardian. Canada's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics is presenting a webcast discussion after the announcement, at 12:30 p.m. ET.
Here are the key numbers: The CMS team said that if it exists, the Higgs boson would have to have a mass somewhere between 115 billion and 127 electron volts (that's 115-127 GeV for short). ATLAS reported a range of 116-130 GeV. Both teams saw "tantalizing hints" of a detection around the 124-125 GeV level, but nothing that could yet be called a discovery. That's because the confidence values are no higher than 3.6 sigma for ATLAS, and 2.6 sigma for CMS.
Wait ... what's a sigma? Those numbers measure how likely it is that the effect seen amid the billions of collisions at the LHC is real rather than a statistical fluke. Suppose you have a machine that flips coins to check whether they've been stamped correctly with heads and tails, rather than two heads. You have to decide when to stop the conveyor belt to remove a coin with two heads, based purely on the machine's report. If the machine flips five heads in a row, you have more than 2 sigma confidence that there are heads on both sides of the coin. If it flips 10 heads in a row, the confidence goes up to more than 3 sigma. If it flips 20 heads in a row, you have a 5-sigma observation. (You could just have someone look at both sides of the coin, but you get the idea.)
In scientific observations, a level of 3 sigma constitutes "evidence" that an observed effect is real, and not just a fluke. You have to go up to 5 sigma to declare a "discovery." Thus, the observations hint at where the Higgs boson might be found, but this can't yet be called a discovery. In its news release, CERN used a different analogy to describe the confidence level, using dice rather than coins: "Taken individually, none of these excesses is any more statistically significant than rolling a die and coming up with two sixes in a row."
Fermilab's Don Lincoln explains the latest results in the search for the Higgs boson.
What's next? However the results are spun, more data will be required to nail down a confirmed detection of the Higgs. The proton beams have been shut down for CERN's holiday break, but they'll be started up again next year. The results so far have raised hopes that confirmation of the Higgs' existence (or its non-existence) will come by the end of 2012. After next year's round of experiments, the LHC will be shut down until 2014 for a major upgrade. It won't ramp up to its full power of 7 trillion electron volts per beam until after the upgrade. There'll be a long wait to get to the deepest mysteries of particle physics — but based on the latest results, there's renewed hope for the Higgs.
More on the Higgs boson and the LHC:
- Collider's new data will narrow Higgs search
- Can physicists crack the big puzzle?
- Tales of the big bang at the LHC
- What's a boson? Tour the particle zoo
- Special report on the Big Bang Machine
- Search msnbc.com for the Higgs boson
Alan Boyle is msnbc.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Leave a Comment:
To continue getting funding till 2020, they had no choice but to release some 'indicative' data. Now the challenge for my research is to show practically the real gravitational mechanism not only in action but to find a practical application for my discovery.
Two peaks at 119 and 125 Gev could mean statistical anomalies rearing their head at different places.
I continue to wager along with Stephen Hawking.
Bravo for all the scientists out there for doing this kind of incredible research. we can only imagine what discoveries lay waiting for us in the years to come. Very exciting!
This is very exciting, and important research!
When can I pick up my new Hover board already?
When can I have my free lunch?
I very much enjoy the videos! I am rather ignorant about subatomic physics, but what little I do suspect has made the subject intensely interesting. The videos are like hor d'ouvres hinting at a gourmet dish.
This Higgs field stuff has always sounded strange to me. I will be interesting to see which way the data goes. Lord knows plenty of truly weird things in physics have panned out so who knows?
If the Higgs boson does exist between 115GeV and 125GeV and two W bosons weigh in at 80 GeV, then where does the extra 35 - 45 GeV mass come from?
Is it possible that the Higgs field is fluctuating in amplitude to "create" the massive bosons, i.e. supersymmetry is not between two particles of opposite quantum numbers but rather the instability of the Higgs field? In which case the Higgs boson is not necessary because the W and Z bosons could exist the same effect by having a oscilating structure.
Good catch on the missing math, though that may be explained as yet another missing particle to be found.
This all still sounds like flawed logic to me, though. How could a Higgs Boson have mass if it is what is being attributed to what gives particles mass? Does it give itself mass? So, the barber does shave himself? It does sound like this description of this puzzle piece presents a paradox?
I definitely lean towards your logic that the Higgs field may have other explanations in addition to a missing particle. The effect may be caused by strings popping in and out of existence that have vibrational and other properties that make up the Higgs field but don't ever coalesce as actual particles or as any of the definitions or types of particles discovered so far.
Mike,
They way I understand it is that the Higgs is what we call anti-matter in layman's terms. If I have that correct that would mean that the Higgs itself has no actual mass once the collision and decay occur; hence why it gives all matter mass thereby depleting its own.
As others have stated, not too well versed in particle physics just stating what I have read and heard about the subject of the Higgs so I could have that wrong.
All this tearing into Space/Time makes me hungry!
In slightly upset that the collision picture has a caption the states a photon was used for the impact. That's a mistake. PROTONS are used for collisions, NOT photons! There is a HUGE difference! However, I'm glad they are reporting the possible detection of the Higgs. And, yes, like the theory states, they are massive!
Rodentrack, I think you're misreading the caption. Those two photons are among the products of the hot proton-on-proton action.
Ah, using "candidate event" to describe the splatter. My mistake. However if the Higgs decayed into two photons, that would be a rare event. I guess that's the reason this figure was presented! (To me, this was just a collision event. A candidate event is the POSSIBLE event for Higgs detection.)
I sometime relate these collisions to Gallagher's "Sledge-o-matic". " It even makes julienne fries. But, you gotta hit that sucker JUUUUUST right!"
What about hot blonde-on-blonde action?
Great videos, thanks for another excellent article Alan!
two Higgs bolson particles walked into an accelerator... one walked out.
ah ah ahhh.
But, it was much fatter!
Ya , as fat as it's now defuncted wife !
If the higgs particle can be manipulated and the mass of an object somehow be eliminated then the object instantly should become lightspeed.
Bottom line take-aways:
1) We have spent a lot of money hunting for this particular snipe
2) We haven't found the snipe, but we found something that might be considered "snipe droppings," which might indicate there could possibly maybe be a snipe out there somewhere.
3) We're all going to take a long vacation now. Hopefully, the snipe will have been nice enough to stay in the exact same location while we've taken a holiday so we won't have to start this entire process from scratch when we return.
4) We might not have the nicest, shiniest new tools to get the snipe - will you taxpayers please get excited about our snipe hunt and fund it for another five years, so we can have brighter, shinier toys to use?
I appreciate the hard work scientists do to pursue these things... but really, enough with the dog and pony shows to try to convince us you've got something when in fact you don't.
cost of LHC- around $10 billion total
cost of Iraq war- around $4 billion per month!!!
I'm just pointing out the relative cost of things...
You have it almost right ... except that they're just going to take a short vacation, then in a couple of months they'll resume looking for the snipe for several more months. They're *sure* they'll catch that pesky snipe next year, and then they'll take a long vacation.
And they think they have the right trap to catch the snipe, but there are other cool critters out there that are worth spending a few more years looking for.
Wait a minute! How long has this thing been online? I've been hearing about it for maybe a couple of years, and now they have to bring it down for 'a major upgrade'?
What is this - a MicroSoft Windows product?
The shutdown maybe related to the initial failure they had when they first turned it on. They under estimated the current through the connector pins and started to melt the pins. So maybe they need to replace a few connectors before they can increase to the higher power?
It is not surprising, they had a similar problem on the F-35 in the early days of the design. It is one of those contradictory events in engineering, the transfer of very high energy across a joint. No matter how thick of a buss bar (copper rod) you use the interface surface is not a smooth continuous one but rather one with many high spot and so creates arching and burns the copper.
If this remains the problem at the LHC we could see a very long shutdown with a potential show stopper. Where is Nikola Tesla when you need him? :-)
I suspect that they want to visually inspect everything and verify and update anything that looks like a potential point of failure before they fire up to full power. While they have a planned shutdown, it's a good time to also make some upgrades to newer technology for better performance and efficiencies.
This is all a bunch of hokum...let's get back to important matters...like, is Tim Tebow channeling direct power from God to enable his end-of-game heroics.
I think John Elway has found the right recipe with this kid. The kid may not have NFL credentials, yet, but he is so inspiring in his work ethic, his teammate spirit, his faith, that it makes all the other players perform at their best level. And this why Denver has become so competitive in their last 7 games.
The same effect great superstars have on losing teams, like Walter Payton on a bad Chicago squad, Payton Manning on a hapless Colts free loafers. Many of the Colts players should be released, it is so hard to watch a Colts game, these free loafers want to collect their big paychecks for nothing.
Bravo for Tim Tebow, very nice story.
Ha, can't compete in the category of intelligence? Go watch football. Your pass has been intercepted and ran back for a touchdown.
You lose.
Nice update. The videos were good too. I found it refreshing that Mr. Lincoln admitted that they may be wrong about the whole thing and have to start over. I am somewhat skeptical about the project, but captivated as well. Should be an interesting year to come. All the science involved in just building CERN is incredible. To speak with any degree of certainty about objects and energy fields so small is amazing.
A complete theory... Can it be said that completness is the enemy of truth.
Truly a "Sheldon" moment.
Its probably just my contrarian impulse but I personally am rooting for them being completely wrong and having to start over. But don't ask me why. I'm kind of snarky that way.
From Jupiter down to subatomic particles, Al, you really must be putting in crazy hours to be able to explain all this in terms most reasonably intelligent people can understand. So, thanks for that - you know I'm a loyal fan.
But you really popped my balloon with this one, which I can only describe as a major revelation: Until today, I always thought the Higgs Boton was a pub in Beantown with one letter missing....
The real question is is there an Anti-Higgs Boson particle as well? Everything that i have read about particles is that there is always a particle with opposite characteristics.
Hopefully once the Higgs has been found we will better understand how the outside force described by Newton effects the velocity of a light photon. Once discovered Light Speed Travel is right around the corner.
He brought up an interesting point. In order for particles to have mass then the Higgs Field would need to be present to give the particle its mass. If true then massless particles such as the photon and neutron could have been created first during the Big Bang when the Higgs Fields had not yet formed thus allowing them to remain massless. After the Higgs Field formed could be when mass was added to the particles.
But this still does not discount that there is some other field or force present within in the Universe that effects photons especially when a photon comes near a black hole that consumes all matter both mass and massless matter. So what we have is a Higgs Field that effects particles giving them their mass and a field opposite the Higgs Fields that effects massless particles such as the photon.
I would have to say that a black hole is comprised of both Higgs and Anti-Higgs Fields. How else would a photon be pulled into the black hole if a black hole only effected particles with mass?
How many people have a university science education here?
Leave him alone mickey, Dwight is doing just fine.
Run Dwight run. :-)
What on earth is tag of yours?
So what's the new possible definition of mass? Any particle that interacts with Higgs?
Another two digit.
Good night Wilma.
Oh get your head out o' your a'ss!
nwmick, it is a statistically fact that he who complains the loudest about an intrusion in privacy isusually guilty of a crime, the people that defend their opened mindedness with their last breath are usually racist, and the student that laughs at anther's explanation or insults their intelligence is usually struggling to understand the concept themselves and is using this defence to steer attention away from the fact that they have no idea whats going on themselves.
Higgs boson walks into church, priest says “We don’t allow your type in here.”
Higgs replies “But without me, how can you have mass?”
- credit to T. Phipps