Higgs particle what is it

The mathematical puzzle had been solved decades ago but whether the maths described physical reality remained to be tested. Imagine an empty region of space, a perfect vacuum, without any matter present in it. Quantum field theory tells us that this hypothetical region is not really empty: particle—antiparticle pairs associated with different quantum fields pop into existence briefly before annihilating, transforming into energy. The Higgs field on the other hand has a really high vacuum expectation value.

When the universe had just come into being and was extremely hot, its energy density was higher than the energy associated with the vacuum expectation value of the Higgs field. As a result, the symmetries of the Standard Model could hold, allowing particles such as the W and Z to be massless. As the universe started to cool down, the energy density dropped, until — fractions of a second after the Big Bang — it fell below that of the Higgs field. This resulted in the symmetries being broken and certain particles gained mass.

The other property of the Higgs field is what makes it impossible to observe directly. Quantum fields, both observed and hypothesised, come in different varieties. Vector fields are like the wind: they have both magnitude and direction.

Consequently, vector bosons have an intrinsic angular momentum that physicists call quantum spin. Scalar fields have only magnitude and no direction, like temperature, and scalar bosons have no quantum spin. The particle associated with the Higgs field is called the Higgs boson. We can even take all our data on particle physics data and interpret them in terms of the mass of a hypothetical Higgs boson.

In other words, if we assume that the Higgs boson exists, we can infer its mass based on the effect it would have on the properties of other particles and fields.

We have not yet truly proved that the Higgs boson exists, however. One of the main aims of particle physics over the next couple of decades is to prove once and for all the existence or nonexistence of the Higgs boson. This particle is the one missing piece of our present understanding of the laws of nature, known as the Standard Model.

This model describes three types of forces: electromagnetic interactions, which cause all phenomena associated with electric and magnetic fields and the spectrum of electromagnetic radiation; strong interactions, which bind atomic nuclei; and the weak nuclear force, which governs beta decay--a form of natural radioactivity--and hydrogen fusion, the source of the sun's energy.

The Standard Model does not describe the fourth force, gravity. Until relatively recently, it was the only one which we understood well. Since the s, however, scientists have come to understand the strong and weak forces almost equally well. It seems to provide a complete description of the natural world down to scales on the order of one- thousandth the size of an atomic nucleus. Electromagnetism describes particles interacting with photons, the basic units of the electromagnetic field.

In a parallel way, the modern theory of weak interactions describes particles the W and Z particles interacting with electrons, neutrinos, quarks and other particles.

In many respects, these particles are similar to photons. But they are also strikingly different. The photon probably has no mass at all. From experiments, we know that a photon can be no more massive than a thousand-billion-billion-billionth 10 the mass of an electron, and for theoretical reasons, we believe it has exactly zero mass. The W and Z particles, however, have enormous masses: more than 80 times the mass of a proton, one of the constituents of an atomic nucleus.

It is currently the only place scientists can create and study Higgs bosons. They also play leadership roles in many aspects of each experiment. This Machine will breakdown time into sections and help us split the Atom under some control. We would control a piece of time and space. Responsible accounts of the Higgs should therefore always reference the name Phillip Anderson and maybe even include something about the Nambu-Goldstone bosons also from condensed matter physics that are part of the Higgs mechanism.

Can dark matter be shaped,bent, or influenced in any way by magnetic fields like potters clay. I wonder if dark matter can be shaped by magnetic field? The two forces can be described within the same theory, which forms the basis of the Standard Model. The basic equations of the unified theory correctly describe the electroweak force and its associated force-carrying particles, namely the photon, and the W and Z bosons, except for a major glitch.

All of these particles emerge without a mass. While this is true for the photon, we know that the W and Z have mass, nearly times that of a proton.

Just after the big bang , the Higgs field was zero, but as the universe cooled and the temperature fell below a critical value, the field grew spontaneously so that any particle interacting with it acquired a mass. The more a particle interacts with this field, the heavier it is.

Particles like the photon that do not interact with it are left with no mass at all. Like all fundamental fields, the Higgs field has an associated particle — the Higgs boson.