'God' particle may not exist - scientists... or does it?!

[irishguy28]

Scientists chasing a particle they believe may have played a vital role in creation of the universe indicated today they were coming to accept it might not exist after all.

But they stressed that if the so-called Higgs Boson turns out to have been a mirage, the way would be open for advances into territory dubbed "new physics" to try to answer one of the great mysteries of the cosmos.

The Cern research centre, whose giant Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has been the focus of the search, said it had reported to a conference in Mumbai that possible signs of the Higgs noted last month were now seen as less significant.

A number of scientists from the centre went on to make comments that raised the possibility that the mystery particle might not exist.

"Whatever the final verdict on Higgs, we are now living in very exciting times for all involved in the quest for new physics," Guido Tonelli, from one of the two LHC detectors chasing the Higgs, said as the new observations were announced.

Cern's statement said new results, which updated findings that caused excitement at another scientific gathering in Grenoble last month, "show that the elusive Higgs particle, if it exists, is running out of places to hide".

The centre's research director Sergio Bertolucci told the conference, at the Indian city's Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, that if the Higgs did not exist "its absence will point the way to new physics".

Under what is known as the Standard Model of physics, the boson, which was named after British physicist Peter Higgs, is posited as having been the agent that gave mass and energy to matter just after the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago.

As a result, flying debris from that primeval explosion could come together as stars, planets and galaxies.

In the subterranean collider which began operating at the end of March 2010, Cern engineers and physicists have created billions of miniature versions of the Big Bang by smashing particles together at just a fraction under the speed of light.

The results of those collisions are monitored by hundreds of physicists not just at Cern but in linked laboratories around the world which sift through the vast volumes of information generated by the collider.

Scientists at the US Fermilab near Chicago have been in a parallel search in their Tevatron collider for nearly 30 years. Last month they said they hoped to establish if the Higgs exists by the end of September, when the Tevatron closes down.

For some scientists, the Higgs remains the simplest explanation of how matter got mass. It remains unclear what could replace it as an explanation.

"We know something is missing, we simply don't quite know what this new something might be," wrote Cern blogger Pauline Gagnon.

"There are many models out there; we simply need to be nudged in the right direction," added Ms Gagnon, an experimental physicist.

Reuters

[sambo9]

I tried to get my head around the Higgs boson for my physics course but I couldn't understand it, so part of me is grateful that it's now deemed non-existent.

[irishguy28]

Higgs boson: Excitement builds over 'glimpses' at LHC

Scientists are expected on Tuesday to present preliminary evidence that the most coveted prize in particle physics - the Higgs boson - has been glimpsed.

While the Higgs is crucial to our understanding of the Universe, it has never been observed by experiments.

At a seminar here in Geneva, teams will present a progress report in their hunt for the tiny particle at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

But the LHC has not recorded enough data to claim a formal discovery.

Finding the Higgs was a key goal for the $10bn (£6bn) particle smasher. The collider hosts two experiments - Atlas and CMS - that are searching for the particle independently.

There is intense excitement among physicists working at Cern, the Geneva-based organisation which operates the collider, over hints that the hunters have cornered their quarry.

"It is a fantastic time at the moment, you can feel people are enthusiastic," Dr Christoph Rembser, a senior scientist on the Atlas experiment, told BBC News. "It is really very lively."

Prof Stefan Soldner-Rembold, from the University of Manchester, called the quality of the LHC's results "exceptional", adding: "Within one year we will probably know whether the Higgs particle exists, but it is likely not going to be a Christmas present."

He told me: "The Higgs particle would, of course, be a great discovery, but it would be an even greater discovery if it didn't exist where theory predicts it to be."

The Higgs boson is a "fundamental" particle; one of the basic building blocks of the Universe. It is also the last missing piece in the leading theory of particle physics - known as the Standard Model - which describes how particles and forces interact.

The Higgs explains why other particles have mass. As the Universe cooled after the Big Bang, an invisible force known as the Higgs field formed together with its associated boson particle.

It is this field (and not the boson) that imparts mass to the fundamental particles that make up atoms. Without it, these particles would zip through the cosmos at the speed of light.

Mass mechanism

The way the Higgs field works has been likened to the way photographers and reporters congregate around a celebrity. The cluster of people are strongly attracted to the celebrity and create resistance to his or her movement across a room. In other words, they give the celebrity "mass".

The Higgs boson

* The Higgs is a sub-atomic particle that is predicted to exist, but has not yet been seen
* It was proposed as a mechanism to explain mass by six physicists, including Peter Higgs, in 1964
* It imparts mass to other fundamental particles via the associated Higgs field
* It is the last missing member of the Standard Model, which explains how particles interact

"The thing about the Higgs is that we always say we need it to explain mass. But the real importance of it is that we need it to make sense of the Universe," said Dr Tara Shears, a particle physicist at Liverpool University.

She told BBC News: "Discovering the Higgs confirms that the approach we have been taking to understand the Universe is correct."

Such deeper motivations underlie the current effort at Cern to dislodge the Higgs and other phenomena. Housed in a 27km-long circular tunnel beneath the French-Swiss border, the LHC smashes particle beams together at close to the speed of light, with the aim of detecting new particles in the debris.

Physicists do not know the mass of the Higgs itself, which has made hunting for it more difficult. They have to look for the particle by systematically searching a range of masses where it is predicted to be.

From 1989-2000, Cern's LEP particle smasher ruled the Higgs out up to a mass of 114 gigaelectronvolts (GeV). To search for the Higgs beyond that mass, physicists needed a much more powerful machine - the LHC.

Statistics of a 'discovery'

* Particle physics has an accepted definition for a "discovery": a five-sigma level of certainty
* The number of standard deviations, or sigmas, is a measure of how unlikely it is that an experimental result is simply down to chance rather than a real effect
* Similarly, tossing a coin and getting a number of heads in a row may just be chance, rather than a sign of a "loaded" coin
* The "three sigma" level represents about the same likelihood of tossing more than eight heads in a row
* Five sigma, on the other hand, would correspond to tossing more than 20 in a row
* Unlikely results can occur if several experiments are being carried out at once - equivalent to several people flipping coins at the same time
* With independent confirmation by other experiments, five-sigma findings become accepted discoveries

The two detectors Atlas and CMS are looking for signs of it among the billions of collisions that are occurring in each experiment. Hints of the Higgs would look like a little spike or "bump" in physicists' graphs.

For more than a week, rumours have been circulating on physics blogs that Atlas and CMS see a Higgs signal at 125 GeV, between the 2.5 and 3.5 sigma level of certainty.

These numbers represent a measure of the likelihood that any bump the scientists see is down to chance, rather than caused by a real physical phenomenon.

If those are the numbers quoted on Tuesday, it would not be enough for Cern to make a definitive statement. Three sigma counts as an "observation", while five sigma is regarded as the threshold for claiming a discovery.

Indeed, Cern's director-general Rolf-Dieter Heuer has told staff by email that the announcement would not be conclusive.

Any such spike could diminish as more data are gathered. But if Atlas and CMS both see a signal in about the same place, there would be an irresistible temptation to pop champagne corks - though behind closed doors.

In public, however, physicists would be obligated to say that a definitive "yes" or "no" would need to wait until 2012.

Asked where a Higgs discovery would rank among scientific milestones of the last 100 years, Dr Shears said: "I don't think that I could compare it to any other scientific advance... it is quite different.

"This is a prediction that stems from a very mathematical approach to understanding the Universe, which is guided by the idea that it is simple at heart.

"If the Universe really is like that, I find it really quite breathtaking and humbling that we can understand it."

[hugo]

I tried to get my head around the Higgs boson for my physics course but I couldn't understand it, so part of me is grateful that it's now deemed non-existent.

The Higgs Boson would explain why/how "things" have mass.

I'm glad the experiment is still moving forward and getting results, this is a really interesting part of physics.

[hugo]

CERN finds particle that resembles long-sought Higgs boson

IDG News Service - CERN scientists announced on Wednesday that they observed a particle that strongly resembles the long-sought after Higgs boson, the final missing ingredient in the standard model of particle Physics.

The scientists wouldn't go so far as claiming the subatomic particle actually was the Higgs boson, known as the God particle, but said the data gave "clear signs" of a new particle that is a very heavy boson, CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, said in a press release. The results are preliminary but it is the heaviest boson ever found, the research institute added. There is more time needed to determine if the analysis of the collected data is correct.

The Higgs boson is thought to be part of the explanation of why matter has mass, which, combined with gravity, gives objects weight. Finding this particle would give scientists a better understanding of the nature of the universe.

The results held as preliminary by CERN are based on data collected in 2011 and 2012, with the 2012 data still under analysis, CERN said. The scientists expect to publish an analysis at the end of July and said they would be able to give a clearer picture of the observations later this year after the Large Hadron Collider, the largest particle accelerator in the world, provides the experiments with more data.

CERN will next try to determine what the precise nature of the particle is and its significance for the understanding of the universe. While the scientists think it could be Higgs boson, they do not rule out that it could be something more exotic. "The Standard Model describes the fundamental particles from which we, and every visible thing in the universe, are made, and the forces acting between them. All the matter that we can see, however, appears to be no more than about 4 percent of the total. A more exotic version of the Higgs particle could be a bridge to understanding the 96 percent of the universe that remains obscure," CERN explained, adding that a positive identification of the new particle's characteristics will take considerable time and data.

"Without the worldwide grid of computing this result would not have happened," said Rolf-Dieter Heuer, director general at CERN during a press conference. The computing power and the network that CERN uses is a very important part of the research, he added.

CERN's Large Hadron Collider generates hundreds of millions of particle collisions each second. Recording, storing and analyzing these vast amounts of collisions present a massive data challenge because the collider produces roughly 20 million gigabytes of data each year. Data is measured at four points along its 27 kilometer length and each point has its own experiments and their own data collector with millions of sensors.A

[BLover]

That is major stuff.

[CrazyCrazy]

Read this, amazing.

[deasy55]

Amazes me that something as important as this gets hardly any replies. Looks like the majority of posters on here only care about divorces or people coming out of the closet

[Eamon]

Massive discovery. It must be such a relief and achievement to see the work and research a person has done for over 50 years finally pay off.

[Timmy94]

I'm very happy for the scientists who found this out and hope they can get even further with it as they are just at the beginning of the exploration of this particle.

Physics isn't my best subject but this sounds like it's really an interesting field, especially as the puzzle pieces slowly seem to fit together and the missing answers to the open questions slowly seem to be found...

[Jesper]

Read this, amazing.

+1

[JimJim]

Updated the thread title

[remiell]

If it really is Higgs boson, then it's amazing.

[Wolfsmagik]

:o

If it really is Higgs boson, then it's amazing.

[randomness]

[BLover]

:o

If it really is Higgs boson, then it's amazing.

And if it's not the Higgs boson, it's even more amazing.

[remiell]

Indeed. If the Higgs boson hypothesis is wrong, then it would mean that many existing theories must be revised. This would be a real revolution.