we're on our way to CERN in Geneva and
this is your mark cameraman and we
should be coming up on it that's the
dome that's a famous cerned oh my bad
this is pretty exciting
on July 4th here at CERN and historic
announcement was made a new particle had
been discovered most likely the
sought-after Higgs boson as a layman I
would now say I think we have it you
agree the finding made news around the
world in boson de Higgs Anubis on Hicks
earth on the booze Louise elbow thought
it was only DX s honor and led to an
outpouring of emotion from the normally
restrained particle physics community
for the discoverers themselves it was
particularly momentous Wow I mean I've
never seen physicists like this it
really looks beautiful I cannot believe
how beautiful it is it had to cry how
beautiful it is that's why we're here
essentially you know that that's that
that's that's the reason why I'm doing
particle physics but now that this
particle has been found what's left to
do at the Large Hadron Collider let's
find out our current understanding of
the universe is based on the modestly
named a standard model a theory of all
fundamental matter particles and their
interactions virtually all of the
standard model has been verified apart
from one crucial element what gives
matter its mass and to be clear that is
absolutely critically important even to
our daily existence because if an
electron would be massless it could not
be bound to a proton you could not have
an atom and then you know sort of all of
you know the Stars the planets chemistry
light not exist wouldn't exist because
instead of electrons bound to protons in
hydrogen atoms and in and in larger
atoms instead you would just have
electrons whizzing off to infinity in
the standard model mass is explained by
the Higgs mechanism of which the Higgs
boson is only one part for example
you've probably heard that the Higgs
boson gives mass to the other subatomic
particles but if that were true
shouldn't there be Higgs bosons
everywhere I mean why would it be so
difficult to create and detect them well
in truth it's not the particle itself
that gives mass to the
they're particles it's the Higgs field
you can think of the Higgs field as a
huge sea of honey that fills all space
some particles are able to travel
through it unimpeded whilst others
interact with it slowing down in the
process and that translates into mass
when enough high energy is added to the
field fleeting Higgs bosons are created
so in order to discover the Higgs
particle we needed to invest energy by
the collision in the higgs field and
create the Higgs particle out of it and
then we know that indeed we have a X and
that's what this incredible machine does
using powerful magnets the Large Hadron
Collider whizzes two beams of protons in
opposite directions around a 27
kilometer circular tunnel when the
protons collide their energy can be
converted into the mass of new particles
like the Higgs boson short-lived
these particles decay quickly and it's
their decay products which are then
analyzed by massive detectors this is
the giant apparatus at the CMS detector
it's one of two major detectors on the
beam line where the protons collide you
can actually see a life-size picture of
the CMS detector I am standing above the
beam line
and so there's protons whizzing around
underneath my feet right now 90 meters
under the ground at speeds that are
basically the speed of light 99.99999
9% the speed of light you may as well
just be the speed of light but of course
a proton can never reach that speed
these are some big toys the other big
experiment examining proton collisions
is called Atlas the teams at Atlas and
CMS each made up of about 3,000
scientists work independently in a sort
of friendly rivalry actually friendly
yes of course it is I mean we what we
always say is that of course it's
essential that if if there's a major
discovery which is made that it's
confirmed ultimately by the two
experiments and independently and that's
why the discovery announced earlier this
year was so dramatic both detectors saw
the same results more or less
simultaneously protons are bags of other
particles when they smash together a
mess of new particles is created and
it's the pattern of the debris that
provides the answers what they saw was
evidence of a new particle with a mass
of between 125 and 126 Giga electron
volts then we say these two large blobs
of energy in the calorimeter and you can
see them over here if you added those
two bits of energy together what total
energy would you get I think in this one
you get 125 GeV so that seems to be
exactly what would be exciting if it's a
with gamma gamma but the question now is
if it is a Higgs is it the Higgs as
predicted by the standard model are you
willing to make a bet about what kind of
Higgs boson this do you think it's the
Standard Model Higgs wow that's a
difficult one no I wouldn't bet my life
on I might bet my life that day we
discovered the Higgs but I wouldn't bet
my life that the easiest and modern
Higgs
it's very difficult to tell all we know
is this there we almost know nothing
about its properties and its properties
are key really to tell us exactly what
it is so to find out the LHC will
conduct many more collisions and this
should allow scientists to determine the
properties of the new particle
if it is not standard model heads we may
be able to tell that early we could even
tell that this year as an example both
experiments are a bit too many photons
too many times the Higgs was decaying
into photons more than you expect more
than you'd expect them in the case of
out strangely that's exactly what these
guys are hoping for that it doesn't fit
the model perfectly that it's not the
Standard Model Higgs let's say the
reason for doing science is of course
we're looking for answers but generating
more questions is an inevitable and and
one of the most exciting pieces of the
scientific procedure and what would that
help you determine I mean if it's not
Standard Model Higgs that's a big thing
if it's not standard while haze then we
know that there's new physics for sure
and if the new physics is along the
lines that we expect then we have
something pretty profound as a
possibility one would be additional
spatial dimensions ok that's one
possibility another would be really
almost a mirror image of the entire
universe in terms of particles that's
supersymmetry and and these things would
be extremely profound
whether it turns out to be the Standard
Model Higgs Corps or something even more
profound one thing is for sure the
discovery of this new particle is a huge
milestone in the long quest to uncover
the fundamental laws of nature