The Future of Particle

Physics

S F King
Southampton, March 22, 2004
universe.exe
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Cosmic microwave background
Our Universe is filled with photons from the time of
atom formation (380,000 yrs). They were produced
during the BIG BANG.
Their temperature distribution gives information
about the age and composition of the universe.

Microwave
Anisotropy
Probe

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 Temperature Maps

Earth

Universe

Relic radiation from the big bang fireball began its journey as visible light 13 billion years ago. During its long journey the
Universe has expanded and its wavelength has been stretched to microwave wavelengths of a few cm. Picture above shows hot
and cold fluctuations which seeded clusters of galaxies. The sound you hear is the (frequency shifted) “sound of the big bang”
during the first 700,000 years, based on BOOMERANG data.
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  1

…means the Universe is flat 7

The Energy Budget
of the Universe

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What have we learned from High Energy Physics?
- Matter is made of particles (“particle physics”)
To understand this, take an apple and a knife, and cut the apple in
half once. Then cut one half in half again. Then continue the process.
After some number of cuts you will arrive at a single atom.

Question: how many cuts are required?

Answer: only 84 times! A single atom

A nucleus
with orbiting
electrons

nanometre
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 The electrical

 

attraction is
caused by
photon
exchange

-




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The nucleus of the atom is positively charged
It is made of protons (p) and neutrons (n)
The protons and neutrons are made of charged quarks
The quarks also carry a new “colour charge”

The quarks
are stuck
together by
gluons

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I think I finally
understand atoms

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 Nothing lasts for ever
The (free) neutron is radioactive and decays after 15 minutes into
proton, electron and “neutrino” (electron-like neutral particle)

This decay process is very weak (15 minutes is an eternity!)

Without such weak interactions the Sun would shut down!

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 Neutrinos from the Sun

Question: How many neutrinos from the Sun are passing

through your fingernail in one second?
Answer: 40 billion! – day and night since neutrinos
can pass right through the Earth without interacting

Photo of Sun taken

underground using
neutrinos 15
W particles – the left-handed alchemists

Just like rifle bullets, quarks and

W
W  leptons spin as they whizz along

W 
 The quarks and leptons can only see
W particles if they spin to the left!
This shatters mirror symmetry!

Electroweak theory predicted a heavy version of the photon

called the Z 0 which was discovered in 1983
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The four forces of Nature

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Quarks and Leptons

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What is the origin of the particle masses?

Mass
t
u
d c
e s
e  b
 


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 The Higgs Boson

In the “Standard Model” the origin of mass is

addressed using a mechanism named after the
British physicist Peter Higgs.
This predicts a new particle: the Higgs boson.

What is the Higgs boson?

In 1993, the then UK Science
Minister, William Waldegrave,
issued a challenge to physicists
to answer the questions 'What is
the Higgs boson, and why do we
want to find it?' on one side of a
single sheet of paper. This
cartoon is based on David
Millar’s winning entry. 21
The CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will
collide protons on protons at energy of 14 trillion
electron Volts (14 TeV)
p p
With such high energy it is
hoped to produce the Higgs H
boson via E  mc .
2

1 TeV 22
The CERN Large Hadron Collider c.2007

Atlas

particle_event
_full_ns.mov 23
 Isn’t all this too expen$ive?

The practical benefits of Particle Physics

- discovery of electrons gave us electronics
- discovery of positron gave us positron emission tomography
- discovery of the Internet at a particle physics lab CERN

The intellectual benefits of Particle Physics

- the greatest adventure of all is the voyage of scientific discovery
- like building a cathedral over generations
- same reason as Chinese went into space
- “(doing particle physics) will do nothing to defend our country
except to make our country worth defending” Robert Wilson
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 Neutrino Oscillations
(only possible if neutrinos have mass)

e 
.


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Atmospheric      oscillations have been seen

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Solar  e       oscillations have also been seen

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 Neutrino Mass

The discovery of neutrino oscillations and hence mass is the greatest

discovery in particle physics in the past 20 years (since W and Z)
In the Standard Model the neutrinos spin only to the left and so travel
straight through the Higgs field without acquiring mass

So neutrino mass implies new physics beyond the Standard Model!

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 A theoretical interpretation
m 1
1. Neutrinos must have a very small mass 
me 10, 000, 000
2. Neutrinos mix strongly with one another

These two facts can be explained by introducing one new heavy

neutrino into the Standard Model which spins to the right
(plus some other less important right-handed neutrinos).

The single right-handed neutrino then couples equally to   and  

causing them to have one small mass, and mix strongly

R R
  SFK 98-

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This is based on the see-saw mechanism

Thanks to David King

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This is based on the see-saw mechanism

Thanks to David King

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What
about
Super-
symmetry?

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 Quote from Ed Witten in preface of
Gordon Kane’s book “Supersymmetry”

“Supersymmetry, if it holds in nature, is part of the quantum

structure of space and time…
Discovery of supersymmetry would be one of the real milestones
in physics…
Indeed, supersymmetry is one of the basic requirements of string
theory…
Discovery of supersymmetry would surely give string theory an
enormous boost…
The search for supersymmetry is one of the great dramas in present
day physics.”

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 What is Supersymmetry ?
There are two types of particles in nature: fermions and bosons.
Fermions have half units of spin, and tend to shy
away from each other, like people who always
stay in single rooms at the fermion motel.
Bosons have zero or integer units of spin, and
like to be with each other, like people who stay
in shared dormitories at the boson inn.
Supersymmetry says that for
every fermion in Nature there
must be a boson and vice-versa.
Supersymmetric particles have
not been observed (yet) so they
must be heavier - SUSY must be
broken by some mechanism 35
SPIN ½ SPIN 0
FERMIONS BOSONS

u c t u c t

Sleptons Squarks
Quarks

d s b d s b
 e     e   
Leptons

e   e  
The Generations of Matter The Generations of Smatter

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 BOSONS

FERMIONS Gravitino W  W  Z0 Photino Gluino

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 What about the Higgs Boson?

Higgs Boson Higgsino

Higgsino
Higgs Boson

A further non-interacting “singlet” Higgs and Higgsino can even

explain the origin of Higgs mass itself (Elliott, SFK, White 93-95)
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 What has SUSY ever done for us?

The Standard Model The SUSY Standard Model acts

requires fine-tuning to one
part in a trillion trillion to
work! - it is rather like
fine-tuning the knobs on
an old fashioned radio
like a Digital radio that
eliminates nearly all the fine-
tuning – however a few %
tuning remains (SFK, Kane 98)

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 So what else has SUSY ever done for us?

SUSY provides an excellent candidate

for dark matter: the spin ½ partner to
the photon which is the lightest SUSY
particle and is cosmologically stable


called the photino!

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 But what else has SUSY ever done for us?
SUSY provides the basis for cosmological theories in which the
Universe naturally inflates to its present size, and explain how
the microwave background radiation appears isotropic

For example a SUSY version of the Standard Model with extra

Higgs singlets has been constructed that explains inflation, large
scale structure, the origin of Higgs mass, and the origin of right-
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handed neutrino mass (Bastero-Gi,SFK, Di Clemente)
OK, but what else has SUSY ever done for us?

Strong

Weak

Electromagnetic

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 t

u c
d s b
e  
e  

The pattern of quark and lepton masses is explained by assigning

each SUSY generation a new charge (SFK, G.Ross 01,03)
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 string1.avi

Strings live in
11 dimensions

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Why wouldn’t we notice extra dimensions?

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Brane New Worlds

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 Top-down or bottom-up?

Both! – nutcracker
Energy approach
1 trillion trillion Volts

1 trillion Volts

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The Future of Particle Physics:

Neutrino SUSY
Physics

Cosmology Strings

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