Those searching for the Higgs boson may at last have
cornered their quarry
Dec 14th 2011 | from the print edition
WELL, they’ve found it. Possibly. Maybe. Pinning down physicists
about whether they have actually discovered the Higgs boson is
almost as hard as tracking down the elusive subatomic beast itself.
Leon Lederman, a leading researcher in the field, once dubbed it the
“goddamn” particle, because it has proved so hard to isolate. That
name was changed by a sniffy editor to the “God” particle, and a
legend was born. Headline writers loved it. Physicists loved the
publicity. CERN, the world’s biggest particle-physics laboratory,
and the centre of the hunt for the Higgs, used that publicity to
help keep the money flowing.
And this week it may all have paid off. On December 13th two of the
researchers at CERN’s headquarters in Geneva announced to a
breathless world something that looks encouragingly Higgsy.
The Higgs boson, for those who have not been paying attention to the
minutiae of particle physics over the past few years, is a
theoretical construct dreamed up in 1964 by a British researcher,
Peter Higgs (pictured above), and five other, less famous
individuals. It is the last unobserved piece of the Standard Model,
the most convincing explanation available for the way the universe
works in all of its aspects except gravity (which is dealt with by
the general theory of relativity).
The Standard Model (see table) includes familiar particles such as
electrons and photons, and esoteric ones like the W and Z bosons,
which carry something called the weak nuclear force. Most bosons are
messenger particles that cement the others, known as fermions,
together. They do so via electromagnetism and the weak and strong
nuclear forces. The purpose of the Higgs boson, however, is
different. It is to inculcate mass into those particles which weigh
something. Without it, or something like it, some of the Standard
Model’s particles that actually do have mass (particularly the W and
Z bosons) would be predicted to be massless. Without it, in other
words, the Standard Model would not work.
The announcement, by Fabiola Gianotti and Guido Tonelli—the heads,
respectively, of two experiments at CERN known as ATLAS and CMS—was
that both of their machines have seen phenomena which look like
traces of the Higgs. They are traces, rather than actual bosons,
because no Higgs will ever be seen directly. The best that can be
hoped for are patterns of breakdown particles from Higgses that are,
themselves, the results of head-on collisions between protons
travelling in opposite directions around CERN’s giant accelerator,
the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Heavy objects like Higgs bosons can
break down in several different ways, but each of these ways is
predictable. Both ATLAS and CMS have seen a number of these
predicted patterns often enough to pique interest, but not (yet)
often enough to constitute proof that they came from Higgses, rather
than being random fluctuations in the background of non-Higgs
decays.
The crucial point, and the reason for the excitement, is that both
ATLAS and CMS (which are located in different parts of the
ring-shaped accelerator tunnel of the LHC) have come up with the
same results. Both indicate that, if what they have seen really are
Higgses, then the boson has a mass of about 125 giga-electron-volts
(GeV), in the esoteric units which are used to measure how heavy
subatomic particles are. That coincidence bolsters the suggestion
that this is the real thing, rather than a few chance fluctuations.
It also bolsters physicists’ hopes for the future. The Standard
Model, though it has stood the test of time, is held together by a
number of mathematical kludges. Most of these would go away, and a
far more elegant view of the world would emerge, if each of the
particles in it had one or more heavier (and as-yet undiscovered)
partner particles. The masses of these undiscovered partners,
though, are related to the mass of the Higgs. The bigger it is, the
bigger they are. And if they are too big, the LHC will not be able
to find them, even in principle. Fortunately for the future of
physics in general, and the LHC in particular, a Higgs of 125GeV is
light enough for some of these particles to be found by the machine
near Geneva.
Wake up, little Susy
This model of a world of heavy partner particles that shadows the
familiar one built up by the Standard Model is called Supersymmetry,
and testing it was the real purpose of building the LHC. The search
for the Higgs is a search for closure on the old physical world.
Susy, as Supersymmetry is known to aficionados, is the new. The
particular superness of the symmetry which it proposes is that every
known fermion is partnered with one or more hypothetical bosons, and
every known boson with one or more fermions. These partnerships
cancel out the kludges and leave a mathematically purer outcome. For
this reason, Susy is top of the “what comes next” list in most
physicists’ minds.
It might also answer a question that has puzzled physicists since
the 1930s. This is: why do galaxies, which seem to rotate too fast
for their own gravity to keep them in one piece, not fly apart? The
answer always given is “dark matter”—something that has a
gravitational field, but does not interact much via the three forces
of the Standard Model. But that is simply to label it, not to
explain it. No such particle is known, but Susy predicts some, and
as they are the lightest of its predictions, they should (if they
exist) be within the LHC’s range. If, that is, what Dr Gianotti and
Dr Tonelli hope that they have seen is real.
It might not be. As Rolf-Dieter Heuer, CERN’s boss, once quipped,
physicists know everything about the Higgs apart from whether it
exists. Technically, that is still true. Despite their having
analysed some 380 trillion collisions between protons since the LHC
got cracking in earnest in 2010, CERN’s researchers have yet to see
signs of the Higgs in an individual experiment that meet their
exacting standard of having only one chance in 3.5m of being a
fluke. The actual number at the moment is more like one in 2,000.
But that does not take account of the coincidence between the
results of the separate experiments. And more data are being
crunched all the time, so it should not be long before the result is
either confirmed or disproved.
If it is disproved there will, after all the brouhaha, no doubt be a
period of chagrin. And then the search will resume, for there are
still unexplored places out there where Dr Higgs’s prediction could
be hiding. After a 47-year-long search, physicists would not give
the hunt up that lightly.
Higgs boson seminar: have physicists found the 'God particle'? – live
Physicists
announce the latest results from the proton-colliding experiments at the
Large Hadron Collider (LHC) including tentative evidence for the
existence of the Higgs boson
An image released by Cern today of a collision detected by the CMS
experiment, showing characteristics expected from the decay of a Higgs
boson. Photograph: Thomas McCauley and Lucas Taylor/Cern
12.50pm:Cern,
the European particle physics lab near Geneva, has called a special
seminar at 1pm GMT at which scientists working on the two main detectors
on the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will share their results. They will
hold a press conference at 3.30pm when they are expected to announce
they have good evidence for the existence of the Higgs boson.
Follow events here as they unfold during the afternoon, including the
announcement, the key data and reaction from around the world.
In
case you've been distracted by other news over the past few months,
here's a quick catch-up.
The Higgs boson is a subatomic particle that was predicted to exist
nearly 50 years ago. Scientists have been searching for the particle for
decades, but so far have no solid proof that it is real.
Although the Higgs boson grabs headlines – unsurprising, given its
nickname, the God particle – it is important only because its discovery
would prove there is an invisible energy field that fills the vacuum
throughout the observable universe. Without the field, or something like
it, we would not be here.
Scientists have no hope of seeing the field itself, so they search
instead for its signature particle, the Higgs boson, which is
essentially a ripple in the Higgs field.
According to theory, the Higgs field switched on a trillionth of a
second after the big bang blasted the universe into existence. Before
this moment, all of the particles in the cosmos weighed nothing at all
and zipped around chaotically at the speed of light.
When the Higgs field switched on, some particles began to feel a "drag"
as they moved around, as though caught in cosmic glue. By clinging to
the particles, the field gave them mass, making them move around more
slowly. This was a crucial moment in the formation of the universe,
because it allowed particles to come together and form all the atoms and
molecules around today.
But the Higgs field is selective. Particles of light, or photons, move
through the Higgs field as if it wasn't there. Because the field does
not cling top them, they remain weightless and destined to move around
at the speed of light forever. Other particles, like quarks and
electrons – the smallest constituents of atoms – get caught in the field
and gain mass in the process.
The field has enormous implications. Without it, the smallest building
blocks of matter, from which all else is made, would forever rush around
at the speed of light. They would never come together to make stars,
planets, or life as we know it.
The
Higgs field is often said to give mass to everything. That is wrong. The
Higgs field only gives mass to some very simple particles. The field
accounts for only one or two percent of the mass of more complex things
like atoms, molecules and everyday objects, from your mobile phone to
your pet llama. The vast majority of mass comes from the energy needed
to hold quarks together inside atoms.
Cern's
live webcasthas
begun,
but the seminar has yet to start. The expressions on some of the faces
in the audience suggest Christmas is about to come early for the physics
community.
Still
trying to get onto the Cern webcast and failing. This is like trying to
buy tickets for the Stone Roses or something. Anyone in the Cern
vicinity or who can get online, do tweet me@alokjhaor
leave a comment below
While
Fabiola Gianotti goes through the slides from the Atlas experiment,
excluding various energies for the Higgs signal, here are some thoughts
from Prof Stephan Söldner-Rembold, head of the particle physics group at
the University of Manchester:
Atlas and CMS have presented an important milestone in their search for
the Higgs particle, but it is not yet sufficient for a proper discovery
given the amount of data recorded so far. Still, I am very excited about
it, since the quality of the LHC results is exceptional.
The Higgs particle seems to have picked itself a mass which makes things
very difficult for us physicists. Everything points at a mass in the
range 115-140GeV and we concentrate on this region with our searches at
the LHC and at the Tevatron.
The results indicate we are about half-way there and within one year we
will probably know whether the Higgs particle exists with absolute
certainty, but it is unfortunately not a Christmas present this year.
The Higgs particle will, 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. This would be a huge surprise and secretly we hope this might
happen. If this is case, there must be something else that takes the
role of the "standard" Higgs particle, perhaps a family of several Higgs
particles or something even more exotic. The unexpected is always the
most exciting.
Fabiola
Gianotti has finished her presentation. So far, we know that Atlas seems
to have found evidence for a bump around 126GeV for something that looks
like the Higgs.
Next up isGuido
Tonelli,
spokesperson for Cern's other main detector, the Compact Muon Solenoid
(CMS). As @iansample says, "So. What we're looking for now is whether
CMS detector has seen Higgs-like signals around the same mass (126GeV)."
Via
theScience
Media Centre,
Dr Claire Shepherd-Themistocleus, head of the CMS group at theSTFC
Rutherford Appleton Laboratory,
said: "We are homing in on the Higgs. We have had hints today of what
its mass might be and the excitement of scientists is palpable. Whether
this is ultimately confirmed or we finally rule out a low mass Higgs
boson, we are on the verge of a major change in our understanding of the
fundamental nature of matter."
(Also: Hooray, I can hear the webcast properly! Well done for inventing
the web, Cern folk, and also for sorting out your IT)
CMS
has released an image of the results of a proton-proton collision (main
pic above) in which you can see four high-energy electrons (green lines
and red towers). This shows the characteristics expected from the decay
of a Higgs boson.
From@stevengoldfarb,
who is a physicist, outreach, education and communication coordinator on
Atlas experiment at Cern: "Looks like our colleagues from #CMS see
similar excesses near 125 GeV. 2012 will be fun! #ATLAS #LHC #CERN
#Higgs"
The latest results narrow the field even more: Atlas has excluded all
masses outside the range of 115–130 GeV, and the CMS team has revised
the range to 117–127 GeV. Raising anticipation still further, each
experiment separately reports that the LHC's high-energy collisions
between protons generated an excess of particles that could be the
products of Higgs particle production. The ATLAS result is consistent
with a 125–126 GeV Higgs at a statistical level of at most 3.6 standard
deviations, and the CMS team reports a 124GeV signal of at most 2.6
standard deviations. In particle physics, a statistical significance of
five standard deviations is considered to be proof of a particle's
existence, and three standard deviations to be evidence that a particle
may exist. The Atlas and CMS results have not yet been combined, so a
joint probability is not available.
The situation is further complicated, says Samuel Reich, by another
signal seen by both experiments at around 119 GeV. Though this is a
weaker signal, its presence has made scientists cautious in interpreting
what is real and what is not in the new data. A sighting of the Higgs
boson at either energy is consistent with the Standard Model of particle
physics, and also with its extension, known as supersymmetry.
Guido
Tonelli's presentation on CMS data seems to suggest that scientists
cannot exclude a Higgs below 127GeV. This complicates the picture from
Atlas results slightly, which seemed to favour a Higgs around 127GeV.
From@Cern:
"All channels combined, #CMS excludes a #Higgs mass from 127 GeV to 600
GeV; sees small excess at 1.9 sigma level below 130 GeV"
Over
at theNew
York Times,
Dennis Overbye writes that there have been "tantalising hints" but no
direct proof of the Higgs.
The putative particle weighs in at about 125 billion electronvolts,
about 125 times heavier than a proton and 500,000 times heavier than an
electron, according to one team of 3,000 physicists, known as Atlas, for
the name of their particle detector. The other equally large team, known
as CMS – for their detector, the Compact Muon Solenoid – found bumps in
their data corresponding to a mass of about 126 billion electronvolts.
If the particle does exist at all, it must lie within the range of 115
to 127 billion electronvolts, according to the combined measurements.
"We cannot conclude anything at this stage," said Fabiola Gianotti, the
Atlas spokeswoman, adding, "Given the outstanding performance of the LHC
this year, we will not need to wait long for enough data and can look
forward to resolving this puzzle in 2012."
Also, Overbye has a nice detail about a room of scientists in New York:
As seen on the Webcast, the auditorium at Cern was filled to standing
room only. At New York University, dozens of physicists gathered in a
physics lounge burst into applause.
Cern
director Rolf Heuer winds up the seminar: "These are preliminary
results, we're talking small numbers, and remember that we are running
[the LHC] next year. The window for the Higgs mass gets smaller and
smaller but it is still alive. We have not found it yet. Stay tuned for
next year."
The main conclusion is that the Standard Model Higgs boson, if it
exists, is most likely to have a mass constrained to the range
116-130GeV by the Atlas experiment, and 115-127GeV by CMS. Tantalising
hints have been seen by both experiments in this mass region, but these
are not yet strong enough to claim a discovery.
"We have restricted the most likely mass region for the Higgs boson to
116-130GeV, and over the last few weeks we have started to see an
intriguing excess of events in the mass range around 125GeV," said Atlas
experiment spokesperson Fabiola Gianotti. "This excess may be due to a
fluctuation, but it could also be something more interesting. We cannot
conclude anything at this stage. We need more study and more data. Given
the outstanding performance of the LHC this year, we will not need to
wait long for enough data and can look forward to resolving this puzzle
in 2012."
Guido Tonelli, spokesperson for the CMS experiment, said: "We cannot
exclude the presence of the Standard Model Higgs between 115 and 127GeV
because of a modest excess of events in this mass region that appears,
quite consistently, in five independent channels. The excess is most
compatible with a Standard Model Higgs in the vicinity of 124GeV and
below but the statistical significance is not large enough to say
anything conclusive. As of today what we see is consistent either with a
background fluctuation or with the presence of the boson. Refined
analyses and additional data delivered in 2012 by this magnificent
machine will definitely give an answer."
Both experiments will be further refining their analyses in time for
particle physics conferences in March 2012. A definitive statement on
the existence or non-existence of the Higgs boson will need more data,
and is not likely until later in 2012.
Here's
theNew
Scientist takeby
Lisa Grossman on this afternoon's seminars:
The ultra-shy Higgs boson may have finally shown itself at the LHC. Both
of the main detectors, Atlas and CMS, have uncovered hints of a
lightweight Higgs. If it pans out, the only remaining hole in the
standard model would be filled.
Even more exciting, a Higgs of this mass, about 125 gigaelectronvolts,
would also blast a path to uncharted terrain. Such a lightweight would
need at least one new type of particle to stabilise it. "It's very
exciting," says CMS spokesman Guido Tonelli. "This could be the first
ring in a chain of discoveries."
Grossman continues:
The Atlas data restricts the Higgs to within 115 and 131GeV; CMS rules
out a Higgs heavier than 127GeV.
Most excitingly, Atlas saw a tantalising hint of the Higgs at 126GeV;
CMS saw one at 124GeV. It is the first time both experiments have seen a
signal at nearly the same mass. "We're very competitive, but once I see
they're coming with results, I'm happy," Tonelli says. "Their results
are important for us. They're obtained in a completely independent
manner."
That mass also paves the way for physics beyond the Standard Model.
Thanks to subtle quantum mechanical effects, a lightweight Higgs needs a
heavier companion particle "acting as a sort of bodyguard", Tonelli
says. Otherwise, the quantum vacuum from which particles appear would be
unstable, and the universe would long ago have disintegrated. If the
Higgs is lightweight, the fact that we are here today suggests there is
at least one extra particle beyond the Standard Model.
While
we wait for the press conference to start, here's some more analysis.
This article on "Higgs mania" from the excellentIn
The Darkblog
starts with the writer being woken at 7am with hints on the radio that
the Higgs would be announced later today:
Evidence soon emerged however that this particular squib might be of the
damp variety. Consistent with previous blogospheric pronouncements, a
paper on the arXiv this morning suggested no convincing detection of the
Higgs had actually been made by the Atlas experiment.
From Cern's rival particle accelerator, Fermilab, apress
releaseoutlining
the results as they see them:
The experiments' main conclusion is that the Standard Model Higgs boson,
if it exists, is most likely to have a mass constrained to the range
116-130GeV by the Atlas experiment, and 115-127 GeV by CMS. Tantalising
hints have been seen by both experiments in this mass region, but these
are not yet strong enough to claim a discovery.
Higgs bosons, if they exist, are short-lived and can decay in many
different ways. Just as a vending machine might return the same amount
of change using different combinations of coins, the Higgs can decay
into different combinations of particles. Discovery relies on observing
statistically significant excesses of the particles into which they
decay rather than observing the Higgs itself. Both Atlas and CMS have
analysed several decay channels, and the experiments see small excesses
in the low mass region that has not yet been excluded.
Taken individually, none of these excesses is any more statistically
significant than rolling a die and coming up with two sixes in a row.
What is interesting is that there are multiple independent measurements
pointing to the region of 124 to 126GeV. It's far too early to say
whether Atlas and CMS have discovered the Higgs boson, but these updated
results are generating a lot of interest in the particle physics
community.
That last point, about how different today's Cern results are from
chance, is crucial in working out how robust the data is. Conclusion:
more data needed.
Rolf
Heuer sits down with Guido Tonelli of CMS to begin the press conference.
Camera bulbs flashing everywhere. I assume this is what it's like at all
science seminars, yes?
Press
conference begins. If you have questions, you can tweet them to the Cern
press office with the hashtag #higgsupdate
"We need many more collisions to get the Shakespeare answer to the
Higgs: to be or not to be," says Heuer.
Fabiola Gianotti – leader of the Atlas experiment – speaks first, says
that what we have seen today is only part of the Atlas science programme.
"It's too early to tell if the success is due to the fluctuations in the
backgtround or if it's due to something more interesting."
Guido Tonelli, in charge of the CMS experiment, says: "We are discussing
the last chapter, we hope, of a story that has lasted 47 years. There
are people in the audience who have dedicated decades to this goal … We
know from today that, in the next year, very likely, we might get an
annoucement that is solid."
He adds that the scientists at Cern will speak more solidly about the
science in forthcoming research papers, hopefully published in January
or February.
Press
conference ends with Rolf Heuer stating: "See you next year with a
discovery."
Scientists making predictions, eh? Fingers crossed he's right.
Reacting to today's announcements from Cern, Columbia University physicistBrian
Greenesaid:
The researchers' confidence in this result, while fairly strong, does
not yet rise to the level at which a definitive discovery is claimed
(there's roughly a chance of a few in a thousand that the data is a
statistical fluke, sort of like the chance of getting 8 to 9 heads in a
row when you flip a coin; the protocol for claiming a definitive
discovery is more like 1 in a million, similar to getting heads about 20
times in a row). But within the next few months, or surely within the
next year, the teams should know whether or not they've found the Higgs
particle.
Our
man at Cern, Guardian science correspondent Ian Sample, has filed his
story about today's announcement, including physicists' reactions.
Early next year, the Atlas and CMS teams will pool their results, a move
that should see the signals strengthen. Both teams are expected to need
around four times as much data before they can finally confirm whether
or not the Higgs boson exists.
"There is definitely a hint of something around 125GeV but it's not a
discovery yet. We need more data! I'm keeping my champagne on ice," said
Jeff Forshaw, a physicist at Manchester University. "It should be said
this is a fantastic achievement by all concerned. The machine has been
working wonderfully and it is great to be closing in on the Higgs so
soon."
Scientists at the European particle physics laboratory in
Switzerland believe they have seen a hint of the so-called God particleLink
to this video
Scientists believe they may have caught their first glimpse of theHiggs
boson,
the so-called God particle that is thought to underpin the subatomic
workings of nature.
PhysicistsFabiola
GianottiandGuido
Tonelliwere
applauded by hundreds of scientists yesterday as they revealed evidence
for the particle amid the debris of hundreds of trillions of proton
collisions inside the Large Hadron Collider atCern,
the European particlephysicslaboratory
near Geneva.
First postulated in the mid-1960s, the Higgs boson has become the most
coveted prize inparticle
physics.
Its discovery would rank among the most important scientific advances of
the past 100 years and confirm how elementary particles acquire mass.
While the results are not conclusive – the hints of the particle could
fade when the LHC collects more data next year – they are the strongest
evidence so far that the Higgs particle is there to be found.
"We have narrowed down the region where the Higgs particle is most
likely to be, and we see some interesting signals, but we need more data
before we can reach any firm conclusions," said Gianotti, who heads the
team that works on the collider's enormous Atlas detector. "It's been a
busy time, but a very exciting time."
Finding the Higgs boson has been a major goal for the £10bn LHC after a
less powerful machine at Cern called LEP failed to find the missing
particle before it closed for business in 2000.
The Higgs boson is the signature particle of a theory published by six
physicists within a few months of each other in 1964.Peter
Higgs, at Edinburgh University,was
the first to point out that the theory called for the existence of the
missing particle.
Ben Allanach, a theoretical physicist at Cambridge University, said: "My
own personal feeling is that they probably have some kind of Higgs. Of
course, discovery cannot be officially claimed yet, but I do feel in my
heart of hearts that we have just seen the precursor to a discovery
announcement."
According to the Higgs theory, an invisible energy field fills the
vacuum of space throughout the universe. When some particles move
through the field they feel drag and gain weight as a result. Others,
such as particles of light, or photons, feel no drag at all and remain
massless.
Without the field – or something to do its job – all fundamental
particles would weigh nothing and hurtle around at the speed of light.
That would spell disaster for the formation of atoms in the early
universe and rule out life as we know it.
Scientists have no hope of detecting the field itself, but discovery of
the Higgs boson would prove that it exists.
While the field is thought to give mass to fundamental particles,
including quarks and electrons (the two kinds of particles that make up
atoms), it accounts for only one or two percent of the weight of an atom
itself, or any everyday object. That is because most mass comes from the
energy that glues quarks together inside atoms.
To hunt for the Higgs boson physicists at the LHC sift through showers
of subatomic debris that spew out when protons collide in the machine at
close to the speed of light. Most of the energy released in these
microscopic fireballs is converted into well known particles that are
identified by the collider's giant detectors. Occasionally the
collisions might create a Higgs boson, but it is expected that it would
disintegrate immediately into more familiar particles. To find it
scientists must look for telltale "excesses" of particles. They appear
as bumps, or peaks, in data.
Particle physicists use a "sigma" scale to grade the significance of
results, from one to five. One and two sigma results are unreliable
because they come and go with statistical fluctuations in the data. A
three sigma result counts as an "observation", while a five sigma result
is enough to claim an official discovery. There is less than a one in a
million chance of a five sigma result being a statistical fluke.
Gianotti and Tonelli led two separate teams – one using Cern's Atlas
detector, the other using the laboratory's Compact Muon Solenoid. At
their seminar yesterday one team reported a 2.3 sigma bump in their data
that could be a Higgs boson weighing 126GeV, while the other reported a
1.9 sigma Higgs signal at a mass of around 124GeV. There is a 1% chance
that the Atlas result could be due to a random fluctuation in the data.
Oliver Buchmueller, a physicist on the CMS experiment, said: "We see a
small bump around the same mass as the Atlas team and that is
intriguing. It means we have two experiments seeing the same thing and
that is exactly how we would expect a Higgs signal to build up."
Early next year the Atlas and CMS teams will pool their results, a move
that should see the signals strengthen. Both teams are expected to need
around four times as much data before they can finally confirm whether
or not the Higgs boson exists. That might be difficult to collect before
the end of next year, when the machine is due to close for at least a
year for an upgrade before it can run at its full design power.
"There is definitely a hint of something around 125GeV but it's not a
discovery yet. We need more data! I'm keeping my champagne on ice," said
Jeff Forshaw, a physicist at Manchester University. "It should be said
this is a fantastic achievement by all concerned. The machine has been
working wonderfully and it is great to be closing in on the Higgs so
soon."
The director general of Cern, Rolf-Dieter Heuer, said: "I find it
fantastic that we have the first results in the search for the Higgs,
but keep in mind these are preliminary results. The window for the Higgs
mass gets smaller and smaller, however it is still alive. But be
careful, … it's intriguing hints in several channels, in two
experiments, but we have not found it yet, we have not excluded it yet."
If the glimpse of the Higgs boson turns into a formal sighting next year
it may be one of several Higgs particles outlined in a radical theory of
nature called supersymmetry, which says every known type of particle has
an undiscovered twin. It is popular among many physicists because it
explains how some of the forces of nature might have behaved as one in
the early universe. Unifying these fundamental forces was a feat that
eluded Einstein to the grave.
Dick Hagen, a physicist at Rochester University who helped to develop
the Higgs theory in 1964, said: "Einstein once said that God may be
subtle but he is not perverse. Today's results seem to favour the
simplest manifestation of [the Higgs mechanism], and that is very
gratifying as it coincides with the choice we made in 1964 – not to
mention the more personal issue that more complicated versions could
easily fail to appear in the lifetimes of its principal authors."
