What’s the Higgs boson?
Britain’s science minister, William Waldegrave, was wondering last spring how to explain why British taxpayers should support the search for this hypothetical subatomic particle when he hit upon an idea: a contest for the best one-page explanation of it.
This month, Mr. Waldegrave announced the winners of the contest at Keele University, each of whom received a bottle of champagne for his or her efforts. They included the chairman of the department of physics at Southern Methodist University, Vigdor L. Teplitz; Doris Rosenbaum Teplitz, a scholar-in-residence at SMU who is married to Mr. Teplitz; and Ian and Mary Butterworth, scientists at Imperial College in Britain.
The four researchers, who have been friends for more than 30 years, combined their thoughts in a single entry and, according to Mr. Teplitz, plan to meet in Paris this winter or spring to drink their prize and “toast the discovery of the Higgs on both sides of the Atlantic.”
The discovery, if and when it happens, could be a bittersweet victory for the Teplitzes.
Both conduct research at the Superconducting Supercollider, a $10-billion accelerator that will search for the Higgs boson, but that may be scrapped if the Senate this month decides to kill the project.
If that happens, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, which is known by its French acronym, CERN, is likely to press each of its member countries to finance a similar collider, the Large Hadron Collider. That’s why Mr. Waldegrave must explain to British taxpayers what the Higgs boson -- a force-carrying particle believed to be the mechanism by which matter acquires mass -- is and why they should finance a search for it.
Mr. Teplitz says he hopes Mr. Waldegrave succeeds, whether or not the SSC is built. But he adds, “Science would be best served if both machines were built.”
The other winners of the prize -- all of whom are from Britain -- are Roger Cashmore, professor of experimental particle physics at Oxford University; Simon Hands of the theory division at CERN; Tom Kibble, professor of theoretical physics at Imperial College; and David J. Miller, a senior lecturer in experimental particle physics at University College.