Just finished a great article from today's New York Times science section on the race to find evidence of the Higgs Boson, or "God particle" as it is often called. PPX players will want to take note—it's mandatory reading if you're following our BOSON proposition (check it out here for the current market price) which seeks to predict who will win the race to find the elusive particle.

In (incredibly) simplified terms, some physicists believe the Higgs boson is the key to understanding several mysteries of the universe's formation that current theoretical models have failed to define—namely, the origin of matter. Heavy stuff, for sure, requiring some equally heavy machinery to study—the likes of which can only be found at the world's top physics labs such as Fermilab in Illinois and CERN's Large Hadron Collider, a powerful particle accelerator currently under construction at CERN's laboratory facilities near Geneva, Switzerland (check out more amazing VR photos like the one at the top of this post).

The article also does a great job in illustrating just how competitive these physicists can get, and the role of their personal blogs, where rumors of findings are posted, re-posted and commented on—taking data previously familiar to only a few dozen hardcore particle physicists in a laboratory lunch room and hurling it into whirlwind of science blogs accessibly to anyone, scientist or not. The article points to Cosmic Variance, a blog maintained by several leading physicists that lives in many a PopSci staffer's favorites list, as well as countless others. Check them out for some delightfully geeky gossip. Oh, and watch that PPX prop! —John Mahoney

NYTimes: "At Fermilab, the Race Is on For the God Particle"
PPX: BOSON

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a massive internationally-funded particle accelerator located in Switzerland, keeps hitting setbacks.  Originally scheduled to power up around 2005, the project's latest snag—supports for the collider's many powerful magnets are failing—has pushed the start date to May of 2008 [this could also affect the Higgs Boson PPX proposition]. Scientists also reported that cooling the massive magnets to the required 1.9 degrees Kelvin (that's cold) seems to be taking “a little longer than planned." Personally, I'm glad they’re spending a bit of extratime to get everything perfect, since one theoretical failure situation could lead to the creation of a black hole that devours the earth.

When the world’s biggest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider, opens next year near Geneva, the focal point of the high-energy physics world will shift from U.S. soil for the first time in half a century. Bummer, indeed. But America’s brightest are busy devising a rescue plan. In April, a panel of U.S.

THE PAPER: A Rotating Black Ring Solution in Five Dimensions


THE JOURNAL: Physical Review Letters, March 11, 2002


THE AUTHORS: Roberto Emparan and Harvey S. Reall


THE GIST: If you know anything about black holes, you probably think their shape can only be spherical. But they might also be shaped like tiny doughnuts. And if that's true, we might be living in a five-dimensional universe.

The call comes in from the control room. Stanford University's particle accelerator—one of the largest machines on Earth—has been shut down because of a failed magnet. This is bad news for the scientists I have traveled across the continent to see: Their experiment was designed to run 24 hours a day and the disruption will cost them reams of precious data. But me, I'm thrilled. Normally, the innards of the radiation-spewing accelerator are off-limits. But idle, it poses no danger.

Buried beneath the plains of Illinois is a monster of a machine designed to mince matter into its most fundamental parts. It's called a particle accelerator, and it relies on 1,000 giant superconducting magnets, 700 scientists and engineers, and more than $10 million in annual electricity bills to keep on running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.