Cern physicists lauded over ‘god particle’

The world’s scientists and politicians hailed the announcement on the 4 July 2012 that physicists at Cern, the European nuclear research centre, had discovered the long-sought Higgs boson, known in the media as the 'god particle'.

The discovery, which helps explain why matter has mass, was the most anticipated achievement in pure science since 2000.

Now that the Higgs boson has been discovered, Cern scientists were emphasising two points: firstly that the Higgs is just the starting point for a programme of future investigation and secondly that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has many other scientific ambitions besides explaining how matter acquires mass.

ESO: Background information: CERN: European Organisation for Nuclear Research http://www.europeansources.info/record/website-cern-european-organisation-for-nuclear-research/

ESO: Background information: Scientists hail ‘Big Bang’ experiment http://www.europeansources.info/record/scientists-hail-big-bang-experiment/

Deutsche Welle, 4.7.12: CERN scientists announce Higgs boson breakthrough http://www.dw.de/dw/article/0,,16071456,00.html

BBC News, 4.7.12: Higgs boson-like particle discovery claimed at LHC http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-18702455

Spiegel Online International, 4.7.12: Researchers May Have Found Elusive Higgs Boson http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/higgs-boson-like-particle-discovered-at-cern-a-842516.html

CERN: Press Release, 4.7.12: CERN experiments observe particle consistent with long-sought Higgs boson http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2012/PR17.12E.html

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