Hint of Higgs Boson? 'God Particle' Buzz Rises
A few anomalous blips of data are giving scientists hope that the elusive Higgs boson, or "God" particle, might soon be found, though it's too early to say whether a discovery is imminent.
Researchers presented their findings at the International Europhysics Conference on High-Energy Physics in Grenoble, France. According to The Guardian newspaper, two independent teams at the European Organization for Nuclear Research's (CERN) Large Hadron Collider (LHC) reported strange data spikes that could hint at the existence of the Higgs boson particle.
One of these particles, the Higgs boson, would be a big "get" for physics, because particles with mass are an integral component of the physical world. The particle's ability to explain so much about the universe earned it the moniker the "God particle." [Twisted Physics: 7 Mind-Blowing Findings]
Now, two separate LHC teams report that they've seen spikes in their data consistent with the Higgs boson. The particle is thought to have a mass between 114 and 185 gigaelectronvolts, or GeVs. (One GeV is equivalent to the mass of a proton, the positively charged particle in the nucleus of an atom.)
"We cannot say anything today, but clearly it's intriguing," LHC physicist Fabiola Gianotti told The Guardian.
"Discovery or exclusion of the Higgs particle, as predicted by the Standard Model, is getting ever closer," CERN's Director for Research and Scientific Computing, Sergio Bertolucci, said in a statement. “Both occurrences will be great news for physics, the former allowing us to start the detailed study of the Higgs particle, the latter being the first proof of the incompleteness of the Standard Model, requiring new phenomena to be happening within the reach of the LHC.”
