Silly Physics question...

[seawasp]

Multiple times I've seen the claim that the function of the Higgs boson is to give particles their mass. However, virtually all particles I know of are described as having mass (offhand I can think of only two I have heard described as massless: photons and neutrinos, and the latter I've heard may not be entirely massless).

So does that mean that every particle out there (minus those few) is actually a particle group -- the named particle plus one or more Higgs bosons?

Comments

[remus-shepherd.livejournal.com]

Not really.

(Keep in mind that my education in quantum physics was 20 years ago.)

You're thinking of particles as, well, particles, but when we talk about the Higgs it might be necessary to think of them more as waves. All particles are waves traveling in gauge fields -- fields of potential that correspond to the fundamental forces. The shape of those fields determine how the wave propogates (or, if you prefer, the forces acting on the particle). The Higgs field is a gauge field that, when particle/waves interact with it, causes gravitational effects upon those particle/waves. Picture the classic rubber sheet -- the 'spacetime curved by mass'. That's the Higgs field.

Now, quantum mechanics insists that everything wave-like must also be particle-like and vice versa, so if you have a gauge theory you must be able to describe it as a particle. The Higgs boson is the particle that arises out of the Higgs field. It's similar to how the photon arises out of the electromagnetic field.

You could say that two electrically charged objects trade photons between themselves in order to sort out the electric attraction between them, and in the same way two massive objects use Higgs bosons to mediate the gravitational attraction between themselves. You *could* say that because it's easy to visualize that way, but it's a terrible and somewhat misleading analogy, as the gauge theory field is what really carries energy between the two objects.

So particles do not gain mass from the Higgs boson. They gain mass by interacting with the Higgs boson, which is the same as interacting with the Higgs field. The universe is a sea of Higgs bosons (which is the same as saying the Higgs field is everywhere) just waiting for objects to interact with them. But they're not attached to massive particles in any way.

Does this help at all? :)

[ninjarat.livejournal.com]

There are matter particles and there are force particles. Matter particles are composed of quarks and leptons. Neutrinos and electrons are leptons. Force particles carry the fundamental forces. Photons and bosons are force particles. The "large" subatomic particles like protons and neutrons are composed of quarks glued together by force particles -- thus the name of the gluon for the particle that carries the strong nuclear force.

The Standard Model requires these particles to have no or negligible mass and experimental data indicates that this is accurate (modulo neutrino oscillation which requires mass -- we think). This leads to the prediction that there is an as-yet undiscovered particle that carries mass: the hypothetical Higgs boson.

This is a grossly simplified summary. I'm not a nuclear physicist. I just run their computers. (No, really, that's what I do here at MIT. :)

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

the function of the Higgs boson

I always read that as Bo'sun, and I come up with a totally different visual picture....

[gary-jordan.livejournal.com]

Is there a Higgs coxon?

[richardboustead.livejournal.com]

I think my favorite description is the one Brian Cox does.

Imagine a roomful of reporters. A normal person enters the room and heads for the opposite side. At the same time a Politican/Celebrity/VIP enters the room heading for the other side as well. All the reporters cluster around the VIP , restricting their movement through the throng. The random person however is able to navigate the room without being slowed.

The reporters are Higgs bosons, the VIP is a massive particle like a gluon, and the random person is a 'massless' particle like a photon.

At least that's my laymans understanding of the situation. I find the area fascinating, but I am most definitely no expert.