The most thrilling scientific discovery of 2012 was the identification of a novel particle at the CERN laboratory, potentially the Higgs boson, named after physicist Peter Higgs. The Higgs Field is believed to confer mass to fundamental subatomic particles such as quarks and leptons, which make up ordinary matter. Higgs bosons are described as ripples in the field, comparable to the ripple you see when you jiggle a rope.
But how does this field impart mass to particles? If this seems perplexing, you're not alone. In 1993, the British Science Minister Mr. Waldegrave challenged physicists to devise a simple way to comprehend the intricacies of the Higgs phenomenon, with a bottle of quality champagne (Veuve Cliquot) as the reward. The winning explanation came from Professor David J Miller of the Physics and Astronomy Department at University College London. It went something like this: Imagine a large cocktail party at the CERN laboratory filled with particle physics researchers. This gathering of physicists symbolizes the Higgs field. If a tax collector were to enter the party, nobody would be interested in talking to them, and they could easily traverse the room to reach the bar.
The tax collector wouldn't interact with the crowd in much the same way that some particles don't interact with the Higgs field. The particles that don't interact, like photons for example, are called massless. Now, suppose that Peter Higgs entered the same room, perhaps in search of a pint. In this case, the physicists would immediately crowd around Higgs to discuss with him their efforts to measure the properties of his namesake boson. Because he interacts strongly with the crowd, Higgs would move slowly across the room.
Continuing our analogy, Higgs has become a massive particle through his interactions with the field. So, if that's the Higgs field, how does the Higgs boson fit into all of this? Let's pretend our crowd of partygoers is uniformly spread across the room. Now suppose someone pops their head in the door to report a rumor of a discovery at some distant rival laboratory. People near the door will hear the rumor, but people far away won't, so they'll move closer to the door to ask. This will create a clump in the crowd. As people have heard the rumor, they will return to their original positions to discuss its implications, but people further away will then ask what's going on. The result will be a clump in the crowd that moves across the room. This clump is analogous to the Higgs boson.
It is important to remember that it is not that massive particles interact more with the Higgs field. In our analogy of the party, all particles are equal until they enter the room. Both Peter Higgs and the tax collector have zero mass. It is the interaction with the crowd that causes them to gain mass. I'll say that again. Mass comes from interactions with a field.
So, let's recap. A particle gets more or less mass depending on how it interacts with a field, just like different people will move through the crowd at different speeds depending on their popularity. And the Higgs boson is just a clump in the field, like a rumor crossing the room. Of course, this analogy is just that—an analogy, but it's the best analogy anyone has come up with so far. So, that's it. That's what the Higgs Field and the Higgs boson are all about. Continuing research will tell us if we found it, and the reward will probably be more than just a bottle of champagne.
References:
[1] https://www.hep.ucl.ac.uk/~djm/higgsa.html
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joTKd5j3mzk&t=15s
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