Higgs boson demystified the mass of subatomic particles!
While reading this article,you will go through;
Probably, it all started with just a question what is mass? We define mass as the amount of matter contained in the body. Further matter is made up of molecules, molecules are formed of atoms and atoms are forged from subatomic particles. Then what is the mass of the fundamental particles like electrons, quarks, etc? We can’t assert the mass of a subatomic particle is the amount of matter contained in it. Because these are the ultimate(fundamental) building blocks of the matter. To solve this puzzle in 1964 Robert Brout, Francois Englert, Peter Higgs proposed a mechanism called Brout-Englert-Higgs Mechanism (BEH Mechanism) or shortly Higgs mechanism in which Higgs boson was described.
1.Quantum Field Theory:-
Before going to the Higgs boson, we should know a little about Quantum Field Theory.
Basically, Quantum Field Theory describes fundamental particles as short of vibrations in the respective field. The field exists everywhere in the universe. For e.g. electron is an excitation in the electron field. For every known subatomic particle, there exists a field. Photons, Quarks, etc. also vibrate in their field.
2.Higgs Mechanism and Higgs boson:-
As per the Higgs Mechanism, there is a continuous field that exists everywhere in the universe. This field was named as Higgs Field. Higgs Boson is the excitation in the Higgs Field. It is called boson because it shows the properties of bosons like it has half-integral spin, it obeys Bose-Einstein’s Statistics, etc. Other than Higgs Boson Higgs Field also has extra excitations. So this was the quantum aspect. But in a more general way, we can say the Higgs Boson is the structural unit of Higgs Field.It is an elementary particles like others in the standard model of the particle physics.The Higgs Boson was initially discovered as a new particle in 2012 by the collisions of other particles in the LHC at CERN.
3. How it explains the mass of the subatomic particles?:-
This mechanism says the particle which interacts with the Higgs Field bounces randomly & travels slower than the speed of light. Which in turn we say that the particle has mass it can’t travel with the speed of the light.
Because we can define mass in a different way. Mass is just a property of a particle like others (charge, volume, etc.) that discourages the particle to move with the speed of the light.
Similarly, the particles which don’t interact with the Higgs Field move without any bounce and attain the speed of the light. The mass of the particle depends on how much it interacts with the Higgs field. The more it interacts the massive it gets.
If we compare electron & photon, electron interacts with the Higgs Fields & travels slower than light but photon doesn’t interact with the Higgs Field. That is why electron has mass while photon doesn’t.
