Discoverer Of The 'God Particle' Awarded Nobel Prize In Physics
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Peter W. Higgs and François Englert were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 2013 on Tuesday for the discovery of the Higgs boson, also known as the “God particle”, which is the theory of how particle acquire mass.
Peter W. Higgs is one of the Nobel Prize Physics laureates for the discovery of the Higgs particle (Creative Commons.)
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded Higgs and Englert in recognition for their groundbreaking contribution in the field of physics.
The prize money worth 8 million SEK ($1.2 million) will be equally shared between the two laureates.
“I am overwhelmed to receive this award and thank the Royal Swedish Academy,” said Higgs, Emeritus professor of theoretical physics at University of Edinburgh, in the statement released by the university.
“I would also like to congratulate all those who have contributed to the discovery of this new particle and to thank my family, friends and colleagues for their support,” Higgs continued, “I hope this recognition of fundamental science will help raise awareness of the value of blue-sky research.”
Englert, a Belgian theoretical physicist, similarly expressed his excitement peaking at the ceremony via phone link, reported BBC.
The two scientists initially predicted the existence of the theory independently 50 years ago. In 2012, their discoveries were confirmed at the CERN laboratory in Geneva Switzerland using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which is a 17 miles long circular tunnel that lies beneath Switzerland and partially under France.
According to the official statement from the academy, the awarded theory is an integral part of the Standard Model of particle physics that is based on the existence of Higgs particle, which explains how the world is constructed and how the universe works.
Higgs particle originates from an invisible field that fills up all space including the seemingly empty universe. The particle is the fundamental to the entire existence of life forms, since all the particles acquire mass through contacts with the field.
Yet Higgs particle only describes the visible massless objects, which accoutns for only one fifth of al the matter in the universe, Although the discovery of the particle provided the missing piece in the Standard Model puzzle, there are still ongoing chase for the unknown particle among the scientists at CERN.
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