The race is on

astroron (Ron) · #1 17-02-2009, 06:14 PM

The American Fermilab have pumped up the challenge

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7893689.stm

renormalised (Carl) · #2 17-02-2009, 06:23 PM

Poor LHC....hope they can fix their problem. Anyway, here's a spanner in the works. What if they don't find the Higgs boson at all. Despite all the science and predictions. There are versions of particle physics which don't require the Higgs to exist for matter to have mass. I think too much faith is being put into the Standard Model. But, if they do find it, then good on them. I'll put my money on the LHC.

Jay-qu · #3 17-02-2009, 06:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by renormalised

Poor LHC....hope they can fix their problem. Anyway, here's a spanner in the works. What if they don't find the Higgs boson at all. Despite all the science and predictions. There are versions of particle physics which don't require the Higgs to exist for matter to have mass. I think too much faith is being put into the Standard Model. But, if they do find it, then good on them. I'll put my money on the LHC.

IMO the symmetries that the standard model includes predict the Higgs. These symmetries have given rise to the best predictions of nature we have to date, thats why there is a lot of faith in them. But even if the Higgs isnt found then a Higg's 'like' particle should still be found.

renormalised (Carl) · #4 17-02-2009, 07:02 PM

It's a possibility, but there's still that chance they may not find anything...even something Higgs like. Only has to happen once for their model to be called into question. Then they have to figure out how they derived what they did in the first place. It may just mean they have to tweak their models to account for the observations. In any case, who do you think will be the first to find it, if they do??. Despite the mishaps, I still think it's the LHC's cookie in the jar.

BerrieK · #5 17-02-2009, 07:06 PM

Hmmn... how do you clean up a tonne of liquid helium?

Okay, you guys who are in the know... just so I know I get how this thing works... that I have got this right...there are LOTS of magnets in an array that are cooled to 1.9 kelvin to become superconductors that conduct electricity without resistance....used to focus the beam along its 27km path to superspeeds, and two beams are focussed to collide head on....and BLAMMO, the interaction causes the 'God particle' presents itself for inspection. BUT A connection failed and queched (heated up) and thus melted, allowing the liquid helium (that was liquid because its so blooming cold) to leak. Is this how it went down??

So... what will they do once they have proven the existance of the 'God particle??'...to what end will this knowledge enhance the human race other than being able to prove a theoretical particle's existance? Will it be used for weaponry?

renormalised (Carl) · #6 17-02-2009, 07:18 PM

Quote:

Hmmn... how do you clean up a tonne of liquid helium?

Very carefully!!!!!

renormalised (Carl) · #7 17-02-2009, 07:27 PM

Basically Kerry, you got it in a nutshell.

What will they do if they find the "God particle"??...Pray to it

There's probably not much it will do for Humanity in general, except make some physicists warm in their hearts when they receive the Nobel Prize for Physics. It'll be just one more step into allowing us to be able to define how our existence is structured and why things are the way they are. As for being put into use as a weapon....we wouldn't even have enough generating capacity on this planet to even be able to use the properties of the Higgs boson to generate a weapon of any kind. We may be able to detect it, but to put that to use takes several orders of magnitude more power and a lot better understanding than we currently have. Maybe in a hundred or so years....or a couple of hundred....we may have an answer to that possibility.

Jay-qu · #8 17-02-2009, 07:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BerrieK

Hmmn... how do you clean up a tonne of liquid helium?

Very easily - it evaporates away very quickly!

Quote:

Okay, you guys who are in the know... just so I know I get how this thing works... that I have got this right...there are LOTS of magnets in an array that are cooled to 1.9 kelvin to become superconductors that conduct electricity without resistance....used to focus the beam along its 27km path to superspeeds, and two beams are focussed to collide head on....and BLAMMO, the interaction causes the 'God particle' presents itself for inspection. BUT A connection failed and queched (heated up) and thus melted, allowing the liquid helium (that was liquid because its so blooming cold) to leak. Is this how it went down??

As far as my understanding goes, yes.

Quote:

So... what will they do once they have proven the existance of the 'God particle??'...to what end will this knowledge enhance the human race other than being able to prove a theoretical particle's existance? Will it be used for weaponry?

Well there is a chance that the LHC will also give us a glimpse of some new physics that we is not part of the standard model. Such as super symmetry or extra dimensions. If it doesnt, we still know there is something wrong with the standard model - because it doesnt include gravity - so the search for the 'theory of everything' will continue and new more powerful particle accellerators may be needed to be built to test the new ideas.. and so the cycle continues

Well just as the article says, there is a chance that the Tevatron will find it, but I think many will wait for the 'smoking gun' evidence from the LHC - it was designed to see this reaction and thus the data will be much better.

renormalised (Carl) · #9 17-02-2009, 07:37 PM

Quote:

Well there is a chance that the LHC will also give us a glimpse of some new physics that we is not part of the standard model. Such as super symmetry or extra dimensions. If it doesnt, we still know there is something wrong with the standard model - because it doesnt include gravity - so the search for the 'theory of everything' will continue and new more powerful particle accellerators may be needed to be built to test the new ideas.. and so the cycle continues

They've been kind of hoping that some snippet of supersymmetry or multi-universe theory will raise its head in the particle reactions in the LHC. I hope it does.

BerrieK · #10 17-02-2009, 07:41 PM

Okay....again just for my own understanding...sorting it out in my head....the existance of the Higgs / 'God' particle is theorised to explain why particles have mass and hence weight when under the effects of a gravitiational field; that is, this particle defines how much 'stuff' there is in something in a sub-particle definition. Is that it??

Is there any correlation between the Higgs particle and Dark Matter (for that matter)?

BerrieK · #11 17-02-2009, 07:45 PM

Hmmnn... I think there is another thread debating whether the black hole or the galaxy came first...perhaps it was the Higgs particle that came first.

renormalised (Carl) · #12 17-02-2009, 08:03 PM

One thing we have to distinguish here and it's very important. Mass and weight are not the same thing. Weight is due entirely to mass undergoing acceleration in a gravitational field. Mass is the energy/matter density that an object contains....even though weight and mass are both expressed in the same units of measurement. The Higgs particle imparts mass to a particle/object. Funnily enough, the Higgs particle has more mass energy than the particle it imparts mass to!!!! However, the lifetime of a Higgs particle is relatively transitory.

As far as it's relationship to "Dark Matter".....who's to say. However it's believed that Dark Matter is undetectable other than it's influence due to gravity, and it's probably not the ordinary matter we associate particles with. Basically, they don't what it is and are only making educated guesses at what it could be.

BerrieK · #13 17-02-2009, 08:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by renormalised

Funnily enough, the Higgs particle has more mass energy than the particle it imparts mass to!!!!

So where does the extra bit of energy / photon go?

Does this fit in with the Push gravity theory side of things?

renormalised (Carl) · #14 17-02-2009, 08:18 PM

Funny you should say that about the Higgs. If you look at supersymmetry, and how the Universe came to be, it was immediately after the Plancke Era (before 10^-43 seconds and 10^-33cms in size), that the Higgs particle flashed into existence. It was the Higgs particle that broke the false vacuum supersymmetrical state of the Universe and kicked off inflation. You can think of perfect supersymmetry as being like balancing yourself upside down on one fingertip. Everything is in balance, yet it's not a normal state of affairs to be in. It's a high energy state. It's broken when you eventually fall over. During the Plancke Era, all forces of nature....the weak and strong nuclear, electromagnetism and gravity were all one force. Everything was in that high energy state. When supersymmetry was broken, gravity "froze" out of the previous state and became separate from the other forces. It was the appearence of the Higgs which was probably the cause of this. Consequently, the universe underwent the period of rapid expansion known as inflation. You can read about this in any good textbook on quantum or particle physics. Or better yet, try and grab books by people such as Michio Kaku, Paul Davies, Stephen Hawking etc, that deal with this topic. They tend to write to a lay audience with these books and make things a little more readable and understandible than the textbooks.

renormalised (Carl) · #15 17-02-2009, 08:31 PM

The energy is imparted to the decay products of the interactions, whatever they happen to be. Photons maybe one of them.

As far as Push Gravity goes, I haven't read up enough on the subject to make comment on this. Been out of the loop for awhile, but I'll go and have a read of things and give my spin on it later. Jay-qu might be able to help you there.

BerrieK · #16 17-02-2009, 08:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by renormalised

. Consequently, the universe underwent the period of rapid expansion known as inflation.

I thought that the theory was that Dark energy was causing the universe to expand (at an accelerated rate)..or is that now and that was then...

Thanks for all this info Renormalised, it it profoundly interesting stuff. I have LOTS of reading to do as you can see.

Cheers, Kerrie

renormalised (Carl) · #17 17-02-2009, 08:43 PM

Quote:

Push gravity theory

Ah....I know what it is now. Le Sage's Kinetic Theory of Gravity....Hmmmm. Revision for me, it looks like

renormalised (Carl) · #18 17-02-2009, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BerrieK

I thought that the theory was that Dark energy was causing the universe to expand (at an accelerated rate)..or is that now and that was then...

Thanks for all this info Renormalised, it it profoundly interesting stuff. I have LOTS of reading to do as you can see.

Cheers, Kerrie

Dark energy and Dark matter are considered two different things. Don't confuse them!!

Yes it appears to be expanding at an accelerating rate now. It appears this kicked in around 2 billion years ago.

Here's some stuff for you to look over....

LeSage Theory

Yedda

Jay-qu · #19 17-02-2009, 09:04 PM

For those that havent looked much into particle physics let me give a really quick overview of the formalism.

The standard model is currently the best and most complete physical theory.

It is a Quantum field theory. That is everything in our universe is formulated as quantised fields. These fields have values for all points in space. For instance, where you have a magnet there is a non-zero magnetic field. There are electric fields, gravitational fields, weak and strong nuclear fields and there is also the Higgs field etc. The Higgs field is non-zero pretty much everywhere in the universe (this was due to spontaneous symmetry breaking, ask if you want to know more).

Each of these interacts via the exchange of virtual particles, particles seem to have mass because they are interacting with this Higgs field that exists everywhere.

It is possible to make these virtual particles 'real' and then detect them, which is what that aim to do at the LHC

BerrieK · #20 17-02-2009, 09:11 PM

Thanks for that info Jay-qu. Very nicely defined for someone like me!!