Post by prossman on Feb 18, 2009 17:41:02 GMT -7
RACE FOR 'GOD PARTICLE' HEATS UP
February 17, 2009
BBC News reports: “Europe's particle physics lab, Cern, is losing ground rapidly in the race to discover the elusive Higgs boson, or ‘God particle’, its US rival claims.
The particle, whose existence has been predicted by theoreticians, would help to explain why matter has mass.
Finding the Higgs is a major goal of Cern's Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
But the US Fermilab says the odds of its Tevatron accelerator detecting the famed particle first are now 50-50 at worst, and up to 96% at best.
Both machines hope to see evidence of the Higgs by colliding sub-atomic matter at very high speeds. If it exists, the Higgs should emerge from the debris.
The LHC has been out of action since last September when an accident damaged some of the magnets that make up its giant colliding ring.
Project leader Lyn Evans conceded the enforced downtime might cost the European lab one of the biggest prizes in physics.
Cern and Fermilab officials squared up at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Chicago.
Identifying the so-called God Particle has been a target for the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern) ever since the LHC was first conceived in the early 1980s.
At the launch of the LHC near Geneva in September, some scientists predicted the Higgs would be revealed as soon as summer 2009.
But just one week later, an accident occurred which will halt experiments at the accelerator for at least 12 months.
Fermilab has taken advantage, cranking up the intensity of research at their Tevatron accelerator in Illinois.
Director Pier Oddone presented the Tevatron's latest data at the AAAS meeting.
‘We now have a very, very good chance that we will see hints of the Higgs before the LHC will,’ said his Fermilab colleague, Dr Dmitri Denisov.
‘I think we have the next two years to find it, based on the start date Lyn Evans has told us.
‘And by that time we expect to say something very strong.
‘The probability of our discovering the Higgs is very good - 90% if it is in the high mass range.
‘And the chances are even higher - 96% - if its mass is around 170GV.
‘In that case we would be talking about seeing hints of the Higgs by this summer.’…”
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February 17, 2009
BBC News reports: “Europe's particle physics lab, Cern, is losing ground rapidly in the race to discover the elusive Higgs boson, or ‘God particle’, its US rival claims.
The particle, whose existence has been predicted by theoreticians, would help to explain why matter has mass.
Finding the Higgs is a major goal of Cern's Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
But the US Fermilab says the odds of its Tevatron accelerator detecting the famed particle first are now 50-50 at worst, and up to 96% at best.
Both machines hope to see evidence of the Higgs by colliding sub-atomic matter at very high speeds. If it exists, the Higgs should emerge from the debris.
The LHC has been out of action since last September when an accident damaged some of the magnets that make up its giant colliding ring.
Project leader Lyn Evans conceded the enforced downtime might cost the European lab one of the biggest prizes in physics.
Cern and Fermilab officials squared up at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Chicago.
Identifying the so-called God Particle has been a target for the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern) ever since the LHC was first conceived in the early 1980s.
At the launch of the LHC near Geneva in September, some scientists predicted the Higgs would be revealed as soon as summer 2009.
But just one week later, an accident occurred which will halt experiments at the accelerator for at least 12 months.
Fermilab has taken advantage, cranking up the intensity of research at their Tevatron accelerator in Illinois.
Director Pier Oddone presented the Tevatron's latest data at the AAAS meeting.
‘We now have a very, very good chance that we will see hints of the Higgs before the LHC will,’ said his Fermilab colleague, Dr Dmitri Denisov.
‘I think we have the next two years to find it, based on the start date Lyn Evans has told us.
‘And by that time we expect to say something very strong.
‘The probability of our discovering the Higgs is very good - 90% if it is in the high mass range.
‘And the chances are even higher - 96% - if its mass is around 170GV.
‘In that case we would be talking about seeing hints of the Higgs by this summer.’…”
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