Higgs particle discovery (almost)

[Le breton]

Higgs particle discovery

I checked that on this forum there is no thread on the Higgs particle, a hypothetical particule that was first theorized by Brout and Englert and not by Higgs as one would naively believe.
Brout and Englert published their idea in French in June 1964, while cleverly Higgs (who does not read nor write French apparently) published his own version of the same thing 2 months later but in English and got all the credit.

When you watch the news on your TV next Tuesday december 13th you will hear that the famous Higgs particle has been ALMOST discovered with an energy of 125 GeV. The newsman will struggle to explain the ALMOST.

He will then use its most stupid nickname of "God particle", which invariably gets even more stupidly translated into French as if the English nickname were "God's particle".

Anyway, I still encourage you to watch the news on tuesday and maybe even read a serious newspaper on wednesday.

If you want to know more about all this wikipedia will be more than happy to oblige.

 

[krebs303]

I'm waiting with great interest. Posted this a couple of days ago it didn't draw any interest. should have posted it in the clinic.
http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showpost.php?p=741476&postcount=7362

 

[Martin318is]

 

[usedtobefast]

 

[daveinzambia]

All i know about the LHC is my dad built it. won an award for it and everything. and he could have your dad in a fight

 

[Le breton]

I'm waiting with great interest. Posted this a couple of days ago it didn't draw any interest. should have posted it in the clinic.
http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showpost.php?p=741476&postcount=7362

Tomorrow I will try to beat the crowd by going to the auditorium 1hr before the 1st talk.

Saturday evening I was at the Geneva velodrome (where they had a very interesting 2 days programme on the 166m track) and talking a to an ATLAS physicist. She didn't reveal anything I hadn't already found on the web (they have sworn secrecy until tomorrow). Actually I already had heard about it the same day as Motl's blog first mentioned it.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2011/12/not-so-secret-higgs-pr-preparations-at.html

Sorry I didn't see/acknowledge your post.

 

[Le breton]

Interesting articles on the same subject
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/12/11/higgs-boson-sighting-will-open-door-to-new-physics-cern/

http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/1...he-god-particle-six-creators-one-nobel-prize/

 

[krebs303]

Sorry I didn't see/acknowledge your post.

It really deserves it's own thread.

 

[Le breton]

It really deserves it's own thread.

Another day, another blog

http://www.quantumdiaries.org/2011/12/12/getting-closer-to-finding-out-if-the-higgs-exists/

 

[JA.Tri]

Another day, another blog

http://www.quantumdiaries.org/2011/12/12/getting-closer-to-finding-out-if-the-higgs-exists/

Ta. I followed link...there is an "invitation" to sign on to mailing list. On following that there was requirement to sign on to CERN. I did not proceed as appears to be restricted...Did you pursue/sign up?

ta js

 

[Le breton]

Ta. I followed link...there is an "invitation" to sign on to mailing list. On following that there was requirement to sign on to CERN. I did not proceed as appears to be restricted...Did you pursue/sign up?

ta js

Sorry, I didn't think about it. Yes I am signed up on CERN website, I didn't think it was restricted.
But the particular blog entry I was referring to isn't very long, here it is :
CERN | Geneva | SwitzerlandView Blog | Read BioGetting closer to finding out if the Higgs exists
CERN has been in effervescence for the last few weeks, with rumors running wild and hopes flying even higher. In fact, for the past few weeks, the physicists from ATLAS and CMS, the two collaborations looking for the Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), have known half the answer. The problem is that the truth lies in knowing the other half, which will only be known officially at a special seminar organized by CERN director general on tomorrow December 13 at 14:00.

What can we expect to find out next Tuesday? Already, in November, the first combined results from the two experiments were released based on 40% of all collected data, excluding large values of the Higgs boson mass. This means, we now know better where to concentrate our efforts.

Looking for the Higgs has kept physicists on their toes for decades. In this case, the theory predicts the existence of this particle. Finding it would be one more confirmation, and a very strong one, that the theoretical description we currently have, the Standard Model, is correct.

At this point, the region at low mass, between 114 and 141 GeV, is where we expect to see something. The Standard Model predicts how many Higgs bosons should be produced at a given mass, and how many of them will decay in a specific way, but it does not tell us its mass. So CMS and ATLAS are searching blindly, not knowing exactly where to look, but also searching using all possible decay modes.

In the low mass range, three different decay channels contribute the most, namely when a Higgs boson decays into two photons, two Z bosons going into four leptons, or two W bosons decaying into two leptons and two neutrinos.

How and when will we know if we have indications from the Higgs boson? If one experiment sees hints of the Higgs boson not only from one channel, but two or even three of these channels, then it’s encouraging. Even better, if not one but both experiments see such signs, and both see them at the same mass, it’s time to call your mother.

This is very much like trying to catch a faint radio signal. We suspect this hidden radio station exists but nobody knows at which frequency it broadcasts. If one search team hears a weak signal using a crystal radio at a given frequency, this is one thing. But say another group also catches something independently at the same frequency using a digital radio, it gets more interesting.

For the Higgs boson, each decay channel represents one different type of detecting technology. Since CMS and ATLAS are looking without telling the other group what they have, if the results that will be presented tomorrow are similar, it could be an indication on the presence of the Higgs boson. But caution will be exerted until we have the irrefutable proof of its presence.

So, stay tuned on December 13 to find out what we have so far…. I will be tweeting live like a little bird from the seminar so you can follow the action as it unfolds from the @CERN account. My colleague Aidan Randle-Conde will be blogging live on the Quantum Diaries site. The seminar will also be broadcasted live from the CERN home page. I will also report the results here towards the end of the afternoon.

Pauline Gagnon

To be alerted of new postings, follow me on Twitter: @GagnonPauline or sign-up on this mailing list to receive and e-mail notification

 

[Le breton]

Ta. I followed link...there is an "invitation" to sign on to mailing list. On following that there was requirement to sign on to CERN. I did not proceed as appears to be restricted...Did you pursue/sign up?

ta js

I guess I had misunderstood what you wanted.

You wanted to follow this

To be alerted of new postings, follow me on Twitter: @GagnonPauline or sign-up on this mailing list to receive and e-mail notification

No, I didn't try to get on her mailing list.

As for CERN external accounts I do not believe there are restrictions at this time, ie. I didn't invoke any special priviledge to get that account, just followed procedures.

 

[usedtobefast]

http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/LHC/ATLAS-en.html

 

[Oldman]

At last the truth will be revealed....the tiny motor in Fabian's bike does exist.

 

[Le breton]

Almost (in the title) is a bit too strong.

The CERN press release is here

http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2011/PR25.11E.html

I got in the auditorium almost 2hr before the first talk, less than 15 min before they stopped admitting people in!

I can't say that I am disappointed, but from reading the various blogs I did expect to come out with a stronger degree of confidence that the Higgs had been found. Who knows, after one or two more months of work on their data the 2 experiments might come up with something a bit stronger.

Anyway, it looks like if the Higgs is really around 125 GeV, CERN will discover it in 2012.

 

[Bike Boy]

at least the standard model avoids crucifiction in the nearest future, seems that modern physics is on the right track after all, which essentially is very good news. of course until furhter data has been collected nothing is certain yet. I know It's not in the spirit of science to hope for anything because god's design is not affected in any way by it, but we would be left scratching our heads quite a great deal if higgs is never confirmed.

 

[JA.Tri]

I note that "finding" the Higgs Boson is rather a matter of analysing data and pointing to a slightly increased incidence of certain events. So it is not a matter of finding and observing an individual /a set of specific collisions and being able to say that is Higgs boson.

 

[Le breton]

I note that "finding" the Higgs Boson is rather a matter of analysing data and pointing to a slightly increased incidence of certain events. So it is not a matter of finding and observing an individual /a set of specific collisions and being able to say that is Higgs boson.

That describes the current situation, but with 5 times more data, at the end of 2012, if you look at what ATLAS alone presented yesterday, it seems to me that in the "Higgs" disintegration channel into 4 leptons we could have a handful of events that would not need any statistical analysis. As I saw it yesterday it loooked like the signal to noise ration for those 8 "Higgs" events was about 1.

(All this assuming that the current data sample is not a fluke in favour of a 125 Higgs)

 

[Polish]

He will then use its most stupid nickname of "God particle", which invariably gets even more stupidly translated into French as if the English nickname were "God's particle".

Anyway, I still encourage you to watch the news on tuesday and maybe even read a serious newspaper on wednesday.
.

After the physics guys/gals discover "God's Particle" we will finally understand how matter was created.

Then we can move on to the biologists and the next mystery - how does Life spring from Matter? How did/does that spark ignite anyway? No one knows do they.

Then comes Consciousness. How does it spring from life? The guys/gals who study brain stuff might help solve THAT mystery.

And what comes next - after Consciousness? And how does it spring from consciouness? I guess that is left up to the mystics, shamans, and your family priest lol.

Happy New Year 2012 BooYah.

 

[Le breton]

......
After the physics guys/gals discover "God's Particle" we will finally understand how matter was created.


Happy New Year 2012 BooYah.

Not at all

Happy 2012 anyway

 

[Le breton]

An update on a famous boson

...............
Anyway, it looks like if the Higgs is really around 125 GeV, CERN will discover it in 2012.

As I was writing this post it occurred to me that many people here might not know that the word boson was coined after an Indian physicist : BOSE. The counterparts of bosons, the so-called fermions, are named after FERMI, the Italian physicist.

Now I'll take you for a spin through the latest news.

When you climb le Petit Saint-Bernard from the Italian side you go through LA THUILE, a nice little village on a rather easy alpine mountain pass.

However I doubt it very much that the throngs of particle physicists who gathered in LA THUILE recently brought their bike to take advantage of it, with the nice excuse that the road to the top is still snow-covered and not opened to traffic.

Higgs' name however seems to have been on everybody's mind, Higgs - in this case - being a short for Brout-Englert-Higgs-Guralnik-Hagen-Kibble's boson.

As can be read here
http://www.quantumdiaries.org/2012/03/07/the-higgs-boson-won’t-be-playing-hide-and-seek-much-longer/

CDF and D0 - at the defunct Tevatron near Chicago - have joined CMS and ATLAS - operated at the LHC - in pointing at the 125 GeV region as the most likely "Higgs" hiding place. (Any comparison with the Tora Bora caves is massively discouraged)

PS . the recent update comes out of this meeting
http://indico.in2p3.fr/conferenceDisplay.py?confId=6001

 

[Le breton]

today we can remove the word almost

I checked that on this forum there is no thread on the Higgs particle, a hypothetical particule that was first theorized by Brout and Englert and not by Higgs as one would naively believe.
Brout and Englert published their idea in French in June 1964, while cleverly Higgs (who does not read nor write French apparently) published his own version of the same thing 2 months later but in English and got all the credit.

When you watch the news on your TV next Tuesday december 13th you will hear that the famous Higgs particle has been ALMOST discovered with an energy of 125 GeV. The newsman will struggle to explain the ALMOST.

He will then use its most stupid nickname of "God particle", which invariably gets even more stupidly translated into French as if the English nickname were "God's particle".

Anyway, I still encourage you to watch the news on tuesday and maybe even read a serious newspaper on wednesday.

If you want to know more about all this wikipedia will be more than happy to oblige.

I don't know if the discovery will be announced first at CERN or in Melbourne at the ICHEP conference, but today will be the day of that famous BROUT (RIP)-ENGLERT-HIGGS boson at 126 GeV.
Be sure to listen to the radio.

Added later :
From one of the top (ex-)CERN theoretical physicists:

Are we close to discovering the #Higgs Boson? http://t.co/gqmwKF0c
And in a few hours watch this
at 9:00 CEST tomorrow via http://t.co/QEUm3XaB #ICHEP2012 Tue 03 Jul

I am not clear whether this will be a webcast from CERN or Melbourne

 

[Le breton]

I don't know if the discovery will be announced first at CERN or in Melbourne at the ICHEP conference, but today will be the day of that famous BROUT (RIP)-ENGLERT-HIGGS boson at 126 GeV.
Be sure to listen to the radio.

Added later :
From one of the top (ex-)CERN theoretical physicists:

Are we close to discovering the #Higgs Boson? http://t.co/gqmwKF0c
And in a few hours watch this
at 9:00 CEST tomorrow via http://t.co/QEUm3XaB #ICHEP2012 Tue 03 Jul

I am not clear whether this will be a webcast from CERN or Melbourne

WHAT A FANTASTIC ACHIEVEMENT FOR MANKIND, FAR GREATER THAN LANDING ON THE MOON!!!!!
There is a new boson at 126 GeV,
in all likelihood it is the Higgs boson and the so-called STANDARD MODEL is about to be fully verified, ready for the following steps.
The repercussions will be immense,
in various fields of science.

Tragically, in the meantime, Assad is destroying his country
and fundamentalists are destroying Timbouctou.

 

[TomasC]

Motl:

...What's more important is what Adam Mann wrote that the value says about SUSY. In reality, 125GeV sits exactly where the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model allows the Higgs boson to sit but it sits outside the interval that allows the Standard Model to be a complete and consistent theory of all non-gravitational interactions in Nature. .

I'm going to sit in my armchair, sip a long drink and watch the inevitable "dialogue" of standard and superstring theorists