Physics Encyclopedia Entry 1781929986
Summary: This entry is about the Higgs Boson, a fundamental particle in the Standard Model of particle physics, discovered in 2012 at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
Overview
The Higgs Boson is a scalar boson predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics to explain how particles acquire mass. It is named after physicist Peter Higgs, who, along with several others, proposed the existence of this particle in the 1960s. The Higgs Boson is a key component of the Higgs mechanism, which describes how particles interact with the Higgs field, a fundamental field that permeates all of space.
The discovery of the Higgs Boson was a major milestone in the history of physics, confirming a fundamental aspect of the Standard Model and providing evidence for the existence of the Higgs field. The Higgs Boson is a scalar boson, meaning it has zero spin and zero electric charge. It is a heavy particle, with a mass of approximately 125 GeV (gigaelectronvolts), which is about 133 times the mass of a proton.
History/Background
The concept of the Higgs Boson was first proposed by Peter Higgs, François Englert, and Robert Brout in the 1960s. They suggested that a new field, the Higgs field, was responsible for giving particles mass. The Higgs field is a fundamental field that permeates all of space, and particles interact with it as they move through space. The interaction between particles and the Higgs field causes them to acquire mass.
The discovery of the Higgs Boson was a long and challenging process. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a powerful particle accelerator located at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, was built specifically to search for the Higgs Boson. The LHC collided protons at incredibly high energies, producing a vast number of subatomic particles. The ATLAS and CMS experiments, two of the four major experiments at the LHC, were designed to detect the Higgs Boson.
Key Information
The discovery of the Higgs Boson was announced on July 4, 2012, by the ATLAS and CMS experiments. The discovery was confirmed on March 14, 2013, when the two experiments reported their results at a conference in CERN. The Higgs Boson was detected by observing the decay of the Higgs Boson into two bottom quarks, which are a type of subatomic particle.
The Higgs Boson is a scalar boson, meaning it has zero spin and zero electric charge. It is a heavy particle, with a mass of approximately 125 GeV (gigaelectronvolts), which is about 133 times the mass of a proton. The Higgs Boson interacts with the Higgs field, which is a fundamental field that permeates all of space. The interaction between particles and the Higgs field causes them to acquire mass.
Significance
The discovery of the Higgs Boson is a major milestone in the history of physics, confirming a fundamental aspect of the Standard Model and providing evidence for the existence of the Higgs field. The Higgs Boson is a key component of the Higgs mechanism, which describes how particles acquire mass. The discovery of the Higgs Boson has also opened up new areas of research, including the study of the Higgs field and its interactions with other particles.
INFOBOX:
- Name: Higgs Boson
- Type: Fundamental particle
- Date: 2012 (discovery announced)
- Location: Large Hadron Collider (LHC), CERN, Geneva, Switzerland
- Known For: Discovery of the Higgs Boson, confirmation of the Higgs mechanism
TAGS: Higgs Boson, Standard Model, Higgs field, Large Hadron Collider, Particle physics, Fundamental particles, Scalar boson, Heavy particle, Higgs mechanism
