Proof found but 'God particle' yet to be seen
Source: Agencies |
July 3, 2012, Tuesday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
SCIENTISTS working at the world's biggest atom smasher plan to announce tomorrow that they have gathered enough evidence to show that the long-sought "God particle" answering fundamental questions about the universe almost certainly does exist.
But after decades of work and billions of dollars spent, researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, aren't quite ready to say they've "discovered" the particle. Instead, experts familiar with the research at CERN's vast complex on the Swiss-French border say the massive data they have obtained will essentially show the footprint of the key particle known as the Higgs boson - all but proving it exists - but doesn't allow them to say it has actually been glimpsed.
It appears to be a fine distinction.
Senior CERN scientists say the two independent teams of physicists who plan to present their work at the CERN complex tomorrow are about as close as you can get to a discovery without actually calling it one. "I agree that any reasonable outside observer would say, 'It looks like a discovery,'" British theoretical physicist John Ellis, a professor at King's College London who has worked at CERN, said. "We've discovered something which is consistent with being a Higgs."
CERN's atom smasher, the US$10 billion Large Hadron Collider, has been creating high-energy collisions of protons to help them understand suspected phenomena such as dark matter, antimatter and ultimately the creation of the universe billions of years ago, which many theorize occurred as a massive explosion known as the Big Bang.
For particle physicists, finding the Higgs boson is a key to confirming the standard model of physics that explains what gives mass to matter and, by extension, how the universe was formed. Each of the two teams known as ATLAS and CMS involve thousands of people working independently, to ensure accuracy. Rob Roser, who leads the search for the Higgs boson at the Fermilab in Chicago, said: "Particle physicists have a very high standard for what it takes to be a discovery," and he thinks it is a hair's breadth away.
Rosen compared the results that scientists are preparing to announce to finding the fossilized imprint of a dinosaur: "You see the footprints and the shadow of the object, but you don't actually see it."
Though an impenetrable concept to many, the Higgs boson has until now been just that - a concept intended to explain a riddle: How were the subatomic particles, such as electrons, protons and neutrons, themselves formed? What gives them their mass?
The answer came in a theory first proposed by physicist Peter Higgs and others in the 1960s. It envisioned an energy field where particles interact with a key particle, the Higgs boson. The idea is that other particles attract Higgs bosons and the more they attract, the bigger their mass will be. Some liken the effect to a ubiquitous Higgs snowfield that affects other particles traveling through it depending on whether they are wearing, metaphorically speaking, skis, snowshoes or just shoes.
But after decades of work and billions of dollars spent, researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, aren't quite ready to say they've "discovered" the particle. Instead, experts familiar with the research at CERN's vast complex on the Swiss-French border say the massive data they have obtained will essentially show the footprint of the key particle known as the Higgs boson - all but proving it exists - but doesn't allow them to say it has actually been glimpsed.
It appears to be a fine distinction.
Senior CERN scientists say the two independent teams of physicists who plan to present their work at the CERN complex tomorrow are about as close as you can get to a discovery without actually calling it one. "I agree that any reasonable outside observer would say, 'It looks like a discovery,'" British theoretical physicist John Ellis, a professor at King's College London who has worked at CERN, said. "We've discovered something which is consistent with being a Higgs."
CERN's atom smasher, the US$10 billion Large Hadron Collider, has been creating high-energy collisions of protons to help them understand suspected phenomena such as dark matter, antimatter and ultimately the creation of the universe billions of years ago, which many theorize occurred as a massive explosion known as the Big Bang.
For particle physicists, finding the Higgs boson is a key to confirming the standard model of physics that explains what gives mass to matter and, by extension, how the universe was formed. Each of the two teams known as ATLAS and CMS involve thousands of people working independently, to ensure accuracy. Rob Roser, who leads the search for the Higgs boson at the Fermilab in Chicago, said: "Particle physicists have a very high standard for what it takes to be a discovery," and he thinks it is a hair's breadth away.
Rosen compared the results that scientists are preparing to announce to finding the fossilized imprint of a dinosaur: "You see the footprints and the shadow of the object, but you don't actually see it."
Though an impenetrable concept to many, the Higgs boson has until now been just that - a concept intended to explain a riddle: How were the subatomic particles, such as electrons, protons and neutrons, themselves formed? What gives them their mass?
The answer came in a theory first proposed by physicist Peter Higgs and others in the 1960s. It envisioned an energy field where particles interact with a key particle, the Higgs boson. The idea is that other particles attract Higgs bosons and the more they attract, the bigger their mass will be. Some liken the effect to a ubiquitous Higgs snowfield that affects other particles traveling through it depending on whether they are wearing, metaphorically speaking, skis, snowshoes or just shoes.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
