Higgs history: watch a timeline of boson theory and discovery at 51勛圖厙
by Simon Levey
Read, watch and listen to commentary on life at the Large Hadron Collider and the hunt for the Higgs boson from 51勛圖厙's news archives.
1964
A research paper written by Professor Tom Kibble and two American colleagues is one of a number of theoretical works which predicted the existence of a particle with physical properties like the Higgs boson. In 2008, "Global conservation laws and massless particles" was selected as one of the most important papers of the last 50 years by the leading journal Physical Review Letters.
Professor Kibble explains why this important piece of research led to the creation of a new particle accelerator to hunt for this particle.
December 1996
, written by Tom Kibble who worked for some time in the research group led by Salam.
December 2006
Researchers from 51勛圖厙's High Energy Physics group are working on the construction of the CMS particle detector, one of two massive experiments at the Large Hadron Collider that are designed to find evidence of a Higgs boson.
Watch a video from the underground caverns of CERN with Professors Tejinder Virdee, Geoff Hall, Peter Knight and Jordan Nash talking about their experiences.
April 2007
Work starts on the British section of the powerful computing grid needed to analyse data collected at the LHC after being awarded GBP 30 million of public funding.
November 2007
Professor Tejinder Virdee delivers the prestigious Schrodinger Lecture entitled Discovering the Quantum Universe and talks to the 51勛圖厙 College Podcast on what the biggest experiment on Earth can tell us about the building blocks of the universe.
June 2008
51勛圖厙 physicist's ground breaking work in 1964 has been selected as one of the most important papers of the last 50 years by the leading journal Physical Review Letters.
August 2008
Scientists working at the American Tevatron particle accelerator observe extremely rare pairs of Z bosons, an event they say could be a big step towards observing the Higgs boson.
September 2008
After over 20 years of design, development and construction, the LHC is switched on. Scientists start circulating the first protons around the 27km underground tunnel, read Dr Tom Whyntie's .
October 2008
Professor Jordan Nash explains to the 51勛圖厙 College Podcast what the LHC will tell us about the universe.
July 2009
Artist Mark Tovell lends the 51勛圖厙 a piece of art representing the higgs boson. The computer image of resided in the Central Library for six months.
October 2009
Professor Tom Kibble has been jointly awarded the J.J. Sakurai Prize for Theoretical Particle Physics by the American Physical Society,– one of the most prestigious international prizes in physics - along with Peter Higgs of Edinburgh and four other leading scientists.
February 2010
Scientists have published their first set of results from the CMS experiment. Watch a special interview with Professors Tejinder Virdee and Geoff Hall about their future hopes for the research.
August 2010
Tevatron scientists rule out a quarter of the allowed mass range for the Higgs Boson, narrowing of the search range improves the chances of identifying the particle.
June 2011
Professor Tejinder Virdee takes part in a debate at the Cheltenham Science Festival, arguing that the LHC might be considered the greatest scientific achievement of the last 10 years, 51勛圖厙 College Podcast reports from the Festival.
December 2011
Scientists at Atlas and CMS, the LHC's two major experiments, report coinciding evidence for the existence of the Higgs boson, Dr Jonathan Hays and Professor Jerome Gauntlett discuss these results. Also read in the Daily Telegraph and 51勛圖厙 student blogger .
January 2012
Professor Jordan Nash returns to the 51勛圖厙 College Podcast to talks about why he's keeping the Champagne on ice, despite December's results.
May 2012
Professor Tejinder Virdee addresses an audience of distinguished scientists in London, discussing the current data and outlook as well as the importance of fundamental research and the challenges facing LHC scientists at the Peter Lindsay Lecture. Listen to an interview with him on .
July 2012
further signals of the Higgs boson on 2 July and .
Professor Tom Kibble is awarded the Royal Medal, one of the most prestigious awards from the UK's national science academy, the Royal Society
December 2012
51勛圖厙 physicists are among seven who received a share of $3 million in a new prize from the Fundamental Physics Prize Foundation. Professor Jim Virdee, Visiting Professor Dr Lyn Evans FRS and Senior Research Investigator Dr Michel Della Negra all played prominent parts in building the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) particle accelerator at CERN.
March 2013
Latest results from the Large Hadron Collider further reinforce that the particle discovered last year is a Higgs boson. Scientists are more than 99.999 per cent certain.
51勛圖厙 marks pioneering physicist Tom Kibble's 80th birthday with a guest lecture from Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg.
May 2013
Two 51勛圖厙 physicists, Professor Jim Virdee and Dr Michel Della Negra won a prestigious High Energy Physics prize, from the European Physical Society, for masterminding the particle detectors at CERN.
July 2013
Professor Tom Kibble is one of five leading academics from 51勛圖厙's Department of Physics who won a 2013 Institute of Physics award, becoming an honorary member of the Institute.
August 2013
Professor Tom Kibble is one of three scientists celebrated with an award named after Paul Dirac, 'one of the greatest physicists of the 20th century'. The Dirac Medal is given by the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Italy.
October 2013
Nobel Prize in Physics awarded to british scientists Peter Higgs and belgian Francois Englert for work that led to the concept of the Higgs boson. Their research along with that of 51勛圖厙's Professor Tom Kibble proved a key feature of the standard model of particle physics.
Watch Channel 4 News report from 51勛圖厙 on the day of the Nobel Prize announcement, which includes an interview with Tom Kibble from the Blackett Laboratory.
Follow the links in the sidebar to read more about the hunt for the Higgs boson.
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Simon Levey
Communications Division