December 25, 2024

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Nobel Prize-winning physicist Peter Higgs dies at the age of 94 – DW – 04/10/2024

Nobel Prize-winning physicist Peter Higgs dies at the age of 94 – DW – 04/10/2024

The man who gave rise to the “God particle,” which helped explain how matter formed after the Big Bang. Peter HiggsHe died at the age of 94, the University of Edinburgh announced on Tuesday.

Physicist acquired Global recognition in 2012When he received a medal Nobel prizeThis is nearly 50 years after the Higgs predicted the existence of a new particle, which became known as the Higgs boson, or the “God particle.”

The university, where Higgs was an honorary professor, said he died on Monday after a short illness.

The Higgs' work has helped scientists understand one of the fundamental questions about how the universe formed: how the Big Bang created something from nothing about 13.8 billion years ago. Without the Higgs mass, particles could not integrate into the matter we interact with every day, the professor announced in 1964.

But it may take nearly half a century before the particle's existence is confirmed. In 2012, in one of the biggest discoveries in physics in decades, scientists at CERN, the European organization for nuclear research, announced that they had finally found the Higgs boson using Large Hadron Collider(LHC).

Experiments conducted at the LHC have proven the standard model of particle physics Detection of the Higgs boson particle – a particle that has long proven to be elusive.

CERN scientists search for cosmic secrets

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What is the Higgs boson?

The Higgs' work showed how the boson helped bind the universe together and give fundamental particles their mass, which is crucial to the existence of all other bound atoms in the universe.

The nickname “God Particle” comes from Nobel Prize-winning physicist Leon Lederman's 1993 book “The Damned Particle: If the Universe Is the Answer, What's the Question?” The name was later changed to “God Particle” after criticism from religious institutions.

Peter Higgs was an honorary professor at the University of Edinburgh.Photo: Sean Dempsey/AP Photo/Photo Alliance

Principal of the University of Edinburgh, Professor Peter Matheson, where Higgs was Professor Emeritus, Referred to as the Higgs As a “truly gifted scientist”. Matheson emphasized that Higgs' legacy will continue to inspire many for generations to come.

AC/GSI (Agence France-Presse, AFP)