Today the science community and media are all abuzz about the announcement from CERN regarding the "almost" confirmed existence of the Higgs Boson Particle - or "God Particle". Unless you have been following particle physics for decades you might not have heard of the Higgs Boson Particle.
Here is a brief introduction about the God Particle: http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/science/higgs-en.html. The bottom line is that the Higgs Boson particle gives mass to the Universe.
As to the CERN announcement itself, here it is: http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2012/PR17.12E.html
It is important to note that the Biggs Boson particle has NOT been confirmed, but rather a new particle that was observed during the two different teams' experiments was observed is thought to be the particle. More experiments will be conducted to confirm that the new particle is the Higgs Boson.
Now as to what does it all mean in terms of the Universe, one has to understand that the very large - galaxies, stars, planets, us, all depends (and exists) due to the very small. Atoms and the particles that make them up, neutrinos, electrons, quarks, etc., make up the Universe we see. So to truly understand the Universe we have to understand the tiniest components that make it up: http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/science/Recipe-en.html
Using the huge atom smasher at CERN as well as other facilities around the world, physicists are able to create particle collisions to see what comes out of these events. That is how the new particle was found and is seen below.
A proton-proton collision event in the CMS experiment producing two high-energy photons (red towers). This is what we would expect to see from the decay of a Higgs boson but it is also consistent with background Standard Model physics processes. © CERN 2012
Here is a great article that puts it all together: http://www.wtop.com/884/2927241/Eureka-Physicists-celebrate-evidence-of-particle
Sky Guy in VA
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