higgs field theory

[redgiantjohn]

im having trouble wrapping my head around the higgs field so correct me if im wrong but its everywhere and fills up all space in the universe,when we walk we move through it and if we throw a ball the ball moves through it, the thing i cant get to grips with is that the higgs field gives the elementary particles mass so if there were no higgs field there would be no particles with mass and there would be no galaxies,stars,planets or humans? would the universe be a gigantic massless void with just photons shooting about? and come to think of it why doesnt the higgs field give mass to photons? is it the particle/wave duality of a photon that prevents this? please tell me to shutup if ive completely misunderstood what the higgs field is/does i wasnt to keen on physics at school but since getting into astronomy ive become a bit fanatical on the subject any wirds that could help me understand a bit better would be very welcome cheers. john.

[redgiantjohn]

just noticed the title of the post is wrong!!! should say higgs not higg damn these chubby thumbs and microscopic keys!!!!

[MikeP]

Can't help with the explanation but I did have a spare s I wasn't using.

Mike

[acey]

im having trouble wrapping my head around the higgs field so correct me if im wrong but its everywhere and fills up all space in the universe,when we walk we move through it and if we throw a ball the ball moves through it,

Correct.

the thing i cant get to grips with is that the higgs field gives the elementary particles mass so if there were no higgs field there would be no particles with mass and there would be no galaxies,stars,planets or humans?

Incorrect. Contrary to what is often said in the media etc, the Higgs does not give mass to everything or explain mass in general. The Higgs only explains why certain particles (W and Z) have mass. It does not explain why protons, neutrons and electrons have mass.

If you like, think of it this way. We're all moving around in the Higgs field but most things don't feel it at all. W and Z do. They're "slowed down" by it, i.e. they feel heavier.

[redgiantjohn]

so do we know why the w and z are slowed down?

[acey]

W and Z are the particles that mediate the "weak interaction"; they acquire mass through the "Higgs mechanism", i.e. spontaneous symmetry breaking. Their mass limits the range over which the weak interaction can work.

If you want to think in analogies, imagine that Higgs field can stick to W and Z (hence "slowing them down") but doesn't stick to other stuff.

If you want to be a bit more precise you could try these articles:

Spontaneous symmetry breaking - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Higgs mechanism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

W and Z bosons - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Hugechris]

Correct.

Incorrect. Contrary to what is often said in the media etc, the Higgs does not give mass to everything or explain mass in general. The Higgs only explains why certain particles (W and Z) have mass. It does not explain why protons, neutrons and electrons have mass.

If you like, think of it this way. We're all moving around in the Higgs field but most things don't feel it at all. W and Z do. They're "slowed down" by it, i.e. they feel heavier.

The Higgs does provide a means of coupling to fermionic matter the Standard Model (SM) Higgs has so called Yukawa couplings to all the fermions (an advanced review can be seen here http://hepwww.rl.ac.uk/hepsummerschool/Teubner-%20Standard%20Model%202008.pdf that shows this mathematically see equations 5.22 and 5.60). The Yukawa coupling of the Higgs is mathematically equivalent to mass for the particle.

The photon does not have a first order coupling with the Higgs field in the SM (unlike the fermions) so there is no corresponding "mass of the photon".

The Higgs mechanism is very interesting and there are hints of similar processes in solid state physics that have similarities in terms of symmetries.

[Ronnie67]

A Higgs field (named after a Scottish physicist Peter Higgs) is a field supposed to be responsible for the genesis of inertial mass (and, because of Einstein's equivalence principle, gravitational mass). When the universe is extremely hot, a Higgs field (which is supposed to have a certain curve of potential energy; as regards the shape of this curve, there is no unique consensus, except for a certain general feature, among the physicists) exerts a wild influence; but we will neglect this here. Once the universe cools down enough, below a certain temerature, the Higgs field assumes a certain value (i.e. a value of the Higgs field) which corresponds to the lowest energy level (i.e. the potential energy is zero, but the value of the Higgs field is nonzero; this level may be called vacuum). And this energy level continues to prevail throughout the whole universe (uniform, nonzero Higgs field).