GENEVA — For more than 20 years, scientists around the world have been searching for an invisible particle that determines the basic properties of matter. The particle, called a Higgs boson, is thought to be a vibrating chunk of the unseen vacuum that underlies everything in the universe.
Today, physicists at the European laboratory CERN are set to announce what they believe is the first glimpse of the Higgs boson.
The evidence is by no means conclusive. However, the discovery is considered critical to physics--not only concluding one chapter but also opening the door to another completely undiscovered realm.
"The Higgs is not just a particle,' said CERN theorist John March-Russell. "It means there's this whole new world out there."
Once physicists understand this pervasive, unseen influence, they will be able to answer a question so fundamental that ancient thinkers probably never even dared to ask it: "Why does matter have mass?"
Said Princeton experimentalist Chris Tully: "I think it will eventually be hailed as one of the greatest achievements you can make in science."
The vacuum of physics gives structure to everything else. Like the strings of an unseen puppeteer, it holds all matter under its influence.
The Higgs field is a fundamental part of this nothingness. It's like water to a fish, an essential ingredient of the universe. And the Higgs boson has enormous consequences: Without this hidden field, all particles would travel at the speed of light. Atoms could not exist.
Possible traces of the long-sought particle were detected during experiments in the 17-mile-around Large Electron Positron collider, or LEP, by crashing atomic particles together at high speeds.
Tracks suggesting the possible presence of the so-far-unseen Higgs have teased CERN physicists with a frustrating succession of appearances and disappearances over the last month. However, evidence accumulated last week finally convinced the experimenters to request an emergency resuscitation of the aging accelerator. CERN officials had previously decided to tear down LEP and start construction of a replacement.
"It's a very pleasant emergency," CERN director general Luciano Maiani, who has been a confirmed skeptic, told The Times on Thursday. "Last week changed everything."
