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International Journal of Modern Physics A Vol. 17, Suppl. (2002) 86-88 World Scientific Publishing Company

M Y L I F E A S A B O S O N : T H E S T O R Y O F " T H E H I G G S "

P E T E R H IG G SDepartment of Physics and Astronomy

University of Edinburgh, Scotland

The s to ry beg ins in 1960 , when Nambu, insp i red by the BCS theory o fsuperconduct iv i ty , fo rmula ted ch i ra l ly invar ian t re l a t iv i s t i c model s o f in te r ac t i n g mas s l e s s f e rmi o n s i n w h i ch s p o n t an eo u s s y mmet ry b reak i n g g en e ra t e sf e rmi o n ic mas s e s ( t h e an a l o g u e o f t h e BC S g ap ) . A ro u n d t h e s am e t i meJef f rey Golds tone d i scussed spon taneous symmet ry b reak ing in model s conta in ing e lem entary sca la r f ie lds (as in G inzb urg -La nda u the or y) . I bec am einteres ted in the problem of how to avoid a feature of both kinds of model ,which seemed to p rec lude the i r re l evance to the rea l wor ld , namely the ex i s t ence in th e spe c t ru m of mass less sp in -zero bosons (G olds ton e boso ns ) . By1962 this feature of relat iv is t ic f ie ld theories had become the subject of theG o l d s t o n e t h e o r e m .

In 1963 Ph i l ip Ande rson po in ted ou t th a t in a sup erc ond ucto r th e elect ro m ag n e t i c i n t e r ac t i o n of t h e G o l d s t o n e mo d e t u rn s it i n t o a "p l a s m o n " . H econ jec tu red tha t in re la t iv i s t i c model s " the Golds tone zero -mass d i f f i cu l ty i snot a ser ious one, because one can probably cancel i t off agains t an equalYang-M i l ls zero -m ass p rob lem ." However , s ince he did no t d i scuss how th etheorem cou ld fa i l o r g ive an exp l i c i t coun ter example , h i s con t r ibu t ion hadl i t t le im pa ct on par t ic le theo ris t s . I f was not unt i l July 1964 th a t , fo llowing a d i sagreement in the pages o f Phys ics Rev iew Let t e rs be tween , on theo n e h an d , A b rah am K l e i n an d Ben L ee an d , o n t h e o t h e r , W a l t e r G i l b e r tab ou t the t echn ica l de ta i l s o f the G olds ton e , Sa lam a nd W einbe rg p roof ofthe theorem, i t sudden ly occurred to me tha t the ingred ien t tha t i s c ruc ia l fo revad ing the theorem i s loca l gauge invar iance . Th i s i s because gauge f reedomcom pl ica tes the im ple m en ta t ion o f Loren tz invar iance .

My le t t e r on how to evade the Golds tone theorem was accep ted by Phys icsLet t e rs . Bu t when , a week l a te r , I sen t them a second l e t t e r ou t l in ing the s imp les t re l a t iv i s t i c model in which spon taneous symmet ry b reak ing genera tes avec to r boson mass ( th e Higgs m ode l ) , it was re jec ted . I t was a t th i s po in t th a t"Higgs bosons" made the i r f i r s t theore t i ca l appearance ; my rev i sed vers ion o fthe second let ter (which I sent for publ icat ion to Physics Review Let ters) drewat te n t io n to " incom ple te mul t ip le t s of sca la r and vec to r boso ns" as a char ac te r i s t i c fea tu re of non -Ab el ian gen era l i za t ions of the mo del . Th i s vers ionwas accep ted, an d the referee (N am bu , as I lear nt when I m et h im in 1984)

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My Life as a Boson: The Story of "The Higgs" 87

brou gh t t o my a t t en t i on t h e r e l a t ed work o f Bro u t and En g le r t .The con t roversy over t he Go lds tone t heo rem d id no t end wi th t he pub

l ica t ion of my two le t ters . G i lber t ra i sed techn ical object ion s , which I wasun able to answer unt i l , a t Ch ap el Hil l in 1965, I ha d s tudie d my Ab el ianmodel in more deta i l . The resu l t ing prepr in t l ed to an invi ta t ion f rom Dysonto g ive a ta lk a t th e Ins t i tu te , P r in ce ton in M arc h 1966; the re I confrontedan audience conta in ing axiomat ic f ie ld theor i s t s whose bel ief in the Golds tonetheo rem was based on t he v igo rous a lgeb ra i c p roo f by Kas t l e r , Rob inson , andS wieca . The nex t day S t an l ey Dese r had a r ranged fo r me to t a lk a t Harvard ,where an equa l l y skep t i ca l aud i ence awai t ed and ; S idney Co leman to ld me( in 1989) that they "had been looking forward to tear ing apar t th i s id io t whot h o u g h t h e c o u l d g e t a r o u n d t h e G o l d s t o n e t h e o r e m " .My P r ince ton and Harvard s eminars succeeded i n conv inc ing peop le t ha tI was no t a c rackpo t , bu t t hey c l ea r ly f a i l ed t o pe r suade t hem tha t t he combi na t i o n of gaug e t heo r i es and spon tane ous sym m et ry b reak ing migh t be use fu l.At Harvard , Shel ly Glashow compl imented me af ter the seminar on "a n icemodel" , but he did not see that this might be the cure for the diff icul t ies of his1961 e lect row eak mod el . T h a t was left to W einbe rg an d Salam th e fo l lowingyear . M ean wh i le , B ro ut , Eu gle r t and I t r i ed f ru it l ess ly to find an app l ica t io nin had ron i c flavour sym m et ry b reak ing .

I t was in 1972, fo llowing the V el tm an - ' t H oof t proof of the reno rm al izab i l -i ty of gauge theor ies , that my l i fe as a boson real ly began. At the in ternat ionalH E P conference a t F e rmi l ab t ha t sum me r Ben Lee , r ep o r t i ng on t he gaugetheo ry bandwagon wh ich had began t o t o l l , a t t ached my name to every th inginvo lv ing spon taneous symmet ry b reak ing , i nc lud ing t he " Higgs meson" .

By 1976 , when L E P was be ing p l anned , t h i s ha d been i n t rodu ced t o exper imental i s t s in "a phenomenological prof i le of the Higgs boson" by John El l i s ,Mary K. Gai l lard and Dimi t r i Nanopoulos . Apologiz ing for the vagueness ofth i s prof i le , they concluded "we do not wish to encourage b ig exper imentalsearches for the Higgs boson, but we do feel that people performing exper i men t s vu lne rab l e t o t he Higgs boson shou ld know how i t may tu rn up" .F i f teen years l a te r , wi th mu ch of th e S t an da rd M odel ver if ied exp er im ent a l l y , John Gun ion , Howard Haber , Gordon Kane , and S a l l y Dawson in " TheHiggs H un ter ' s Gu ide" fe lt ab le to be m ore asser t ive: "Th e success of th eS tandard Mode l has been as ton i sh ing . The cen t ra l p rob l em today i n pa r t i c l ephys i cs is t o und ers t an d t h e Higgs s ec to r" .

F rom 1989 onw ard m easu rem en t s a t LE P defined t he pa ram ete r s of t heS tandard Mode l wi th ever i nc reas ing p rec i s ion . Once t he t op quark had beendiscovered a t Fermi lab , the f i t be tween exper iment and theory a t one- looplevel dep end ed only ( logar i thm ical ly) on th e Higgs m ass( es ) . T he p red ic ted

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mass range ind ica ted tha t a Higgs boson migh t be wi th in the reach o f LEP' slas t ru n. As is wel l kno wn , som e pro m ising even ts were seen at aro un d 115Ge V in th e last wee k before L E P closed in th e Fall of 2000. Now it is forFermi lab to con t inue the search fo r "Phys ics ' mos t -wanted par t i c l e ."

Int.J.Mod.

Phys.A2002.1

7:86-88.

Downloadedfromwww.worldscientific.co

m

byDr.JoseA.

Vallejoon09/1

6/12.

Forpersonaluseonly.