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tags: #physics #quantum-mechanics #particle-physics

The Higgs Boson is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics. It is the quantum excitation of the Higgs field, a fundamental field that permeates the entire universe.

The primary role of the Higgs field is to give mass to other fundamental particles, such as electrons and quarks. Particles that interact strongly with the Higgs field have a large mass, while those that interact weakly have a small mass. Particles like the photon do not interact with the Higgs field at all, and are therefore massless.

The existence of the Higgs Boson was predicted in the 1960s and finally confirmed in 2012 at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. Its discovery was a landmark achievement, completing the Standard Model and providing a mechanism for one of the most fundamental properties of matter: mass.

Reference

Coursera, "Question Reality: Matter"