Jens Erler recently updated his calculations for a probability density function for the Higgs boson mass (MH), based on measurements and searches. The article is arXiv:1002.1320.
The whole discussion is couched in the standard model, so the conclusions pertain only to the standard model Higgs boson, the properties of which are well known as a [...]
As physicists from Fermilab’s Tevatron collider experiments, CDF and DZero, prepare to share their newest results at upcoming winter 2010 physics conferences, they took a few moments recently to look back on the accomplishments of 2009.
“By every measure,” said DZero spokesperson and University of Manchester physicist Stefan Soldner-Rembold, “the Tevatron set new records and built [...]
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This weekend our department had a Physics Fair, free to the public, where hundreds of parents and kids came and learned about the research we’re involved in. There were grad students and professors available from many research groups including plasma, condensed matter, astrophysics, particle physics, and more.
I enjoyed interacting with the public and letting them [...]
At the 2010 April Meeting of the American Physical Society last week in Washington DC, SLAC physicist Herman Winick accepted the Andrei Sakharov Prize, given to a physicist for outstanding leadership and/or achievements in upholding human rights.
The curvy MINOS surface building at Fermilab has a new neighbor. The new neutrino experiment in town recently moved in right next door. 
Three decades ago, no one had ever heard of particle astrophysics. How could the tiniest pieces of matter and the biggest objects in the universe coexist in a single field of science? Last month, the American Institute of Physics and the American Astronomical Society honored two scientists who, more than any others, made particle astrophysics, if not a household name, a new scientific discipline.
Jets of particles streaming from black holes in far-away galaxies operate differently than previously thought, according to a study published today in Nature. The new study reveals that most of the jet's light—gamma rays, the universe's most energetic form of light—is created much farther from the black hole than expected and suggests a more complex shape for the jet.
New images from the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope show where supernova remnants emit radiation a billion times more energetic than visible light. The images bring astronomers a step closer to understanding the source of some of the universe’s most energetic particles--cosmic rays.
: skip to main skip to sidebar The Science of Conundrums THE IMPACT OF MEGASCIENCE Sunday , February 14, 2010 CERN Escape Pod Ready At The LHC Yellow Submarine Prepared For Launch Just In Case Collider safety has always been a hot button issue at the LHC . Now we know just where that button is connected . CERN of course will say that their Escape Pod is the CMS Coldbox , and it does look suspiciously like the CMS Coldbox . That's what you would expect . Helium cryogenics are mandatory in any OMG Pod scenario . CERN like it's been telling us all along is now finally ready for any safety . issues Hot hadrons , pas de problème The Yellow Sub project was fast-tracked years ago when rumors from RHIC of signals suspiciously like Quark-Gluon Soup , were circulating at collider conferences confirming earlier rumors from CERN's old . LEP Now Hot Quark Soup has been definitely confirmed by RHIC at RHIC . The soup of course is served very hot at 7 Trillion Degrees F or in Europe at 4 Trillion . C Enough to melt a collider or a planet or pick any star . Fortunately the RHIC ran out of collider juice before physicists could cage a sample . Though the LHC has plenty of juice , 70 times more at
Feeling like Valentine’s Day is a little too cutesy for an intellectual heavyweight such as yourself? Nonsense; the heart may have its reasons, but reason can certainly figure them out, given sufficient grant funding and some diligent graduate students. Jennifer Ouellette points to a talk by Mary Roach that is safe for TED [...]
The experiments at CERN are, in total, a collaboration of several thousands of physicists, scientists, engineers, and students. Here I show the make-up of just graduate students from just one of the experiments at CERN, the CMS detector.
People come from all over the world to contribute to these projects. It’s fantastic that so many countries [...]
Swiss police were yesterday involved in a high speed pursuit after the Large Hadron Collider was hot
What would you think of having a black hole in your backyard? Well, not your actual backyard —
Today the first CMS physics paper appeared on the arXiv, 1002.0621,
Transverse momentum and pseudorapidity distributions of charged hadrons in pp collisions at √s = 0.9 and 2.36 TeV.
This paper reports measurements similar to, but going beyond, the ALICE paper,
which I discussed earlier on this blog.
Notice that data from the √s = 2.36 TeV data are included – [...]
We are at the stage now where the ability to crank up the intensity and energy of the LHC beams to full power is at hand. We’re like a toddler that just learned to walk: the urge to run is present and exciting, but the probability of banging our head would be high!
It has been [...]
On the day of Obama's first State of the Union address, after a first year in office that saw spectacular squandering of political capital by him and the Democrats, I found in my mailbox the Feb. 1st New Yorker with a brilliant cover that says it all. It is called "First Anniversary", and is by Barry Blitt. Click for larger view:
-cvj
It’s an exciting time for your humble LHC blogger. She may just have a thesis topic… So what does that mean? (I often times wonder that myself).
With the recent success and in anticipation of high energy collisions (and therefore data), it’s time to figure out what can be found and what can’t given the projected [...]
What is the main thing that a graduate students in particle physics spends most of their time doing?
Here are the most common activities:
A) Working with pen & paper, staring at equations, using computers to help solve/simplify those equations
B) Building/fixing hardware, Running wires, Connecting cables, Soldering connections
C) Writing computer code, Debugging code written by others, Documenting [...]
One of the most amazing characteristics of science is reproducibility, i.e., experimental results can be reproduced by independent tests. So, the first thing to check in any physics experiment is to see if you can reproduce what older, well tested, experiments have found running in similar conditions. CMS did this very quickly last November when [...]
This pas week the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Northwestern University hosted the Heilborn Symposium. Our guests were James York, Jacques Laskar and Murray Gell-Mann, and the program focussed on complexity in nature. The Heilborn Series is meant to enhance the intellectual experience of students and faculty, and as part of the [...]
Despite lots of empirical evidence to the contrary, I tend to think of proton-proton interactions as the collision of single partons (quarks and/or gluons, one from each incoming proton) giving rise to all sorts of rich phenomena. A recent paper by Berger, Jackson and Shaughnessy reminded me that this way of thinking is too [...]