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CERN to give update on search for Higgs boson

AFP

Posted On Tuesday, June 26, 2012 at 08:16:39 AM

Geneva: The European Organisation for Nuclear Research said Friday it may announce next month whether tests with its atom-smasher have found the elusive “God particle”.


Known formally as the Higgs boson, the particle is the theoretical missing link in the standard model of physics and is believed to be what gives objects mass, though scientists have never been able to pin it down.

The organisation, known as CERN, saids that at a July 4 Geneva conference it will “deliver the latest update in the search for the Higgs boson.”

The theory behind the so-called God particle is that mass does not derive from particles themselves but instead comes from a boson that interacts strongly with some particles but less, if at all, with others.

“In December we said that there were hints in the data that there may be something there (but) not strong enough to say it’s a discovery or not,” said CERN spokesman James Gillies.

“On July 4 we will be able to say whether either there is nothing in the data this year; or there are still hints in the data, but not strong enough for us to be able to say that it is a discovery; and possibly a discovery,” he said. “Either is possible.”

The Large Hadron Collider, sometimes called the world’s largest machine, is located in a 27-kilometre ring-shaped tunnel near Geneva that straddles the Franco-Swiss border up to 175 metres below ground.

It fires streams of protons in opposite, but parallel, directions in the tunnel. The beams are then bent by powerful magnets so that some of the protons collide in four giant labs, which are lined with detectors to record the debris that results.

If and when a new particle is discovered, scientists will need time to ascertain that it is indeed the Higgs boson, or some other, unknown particle. 







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