The Higgs Boson
I have heard many commentators try to explain about the Higgs boson and the search for its existence.
All have failed to make head or tail of the complex subject. Admittedly, my physics stopped at A-level in 1965, but I have read extensively to extend my knowledge.
However, Phil Allport of Liverpool University, explained it all pretty well in words that I could understand. Or at least the detection process, even if the theory of the boson’s existence, is way beyond me.
But I should say, that if Professor Allport were to write a Brief History of the Higg’s Boson, I’d certainly buy it, as it is my type of holiday read. But then I read a book called something like, In search of the Quark, by a pool in the West Indies, only to find that one of the other guests was a Professor of Physics at a prestigious American university. it was this book, that got me looking for Lise Meitner. Sadly, it’s gone the way of a lot of my books.
Again, I wish I’d videoed his talk.
ATLAS
ATLAS is the name of one of the experiments performed at CERN.
Liverpool University had a significant part in the building of this experiment. Their participation is described here.
CERN And Liverpool University
We were then treated to a lecture, about how Liverpool University fitted into the CERN firmament. Here’s some pictures that I took.
I think I should have made a video.
I can’t find a decent tome about how CERN and Liverpool University started their collaboration, so if anybody has one, send me a link, as the history of science fascinates me. That has led me to two of my heroes being Lise Meitner and Rosalind Franklin.
Nuclear physics at Liverpool dates back to the 1930s, when James Chadwick, who discovered the neutron, was appointed professor. The story of his research at Liverpool and the building of the cyclotron there is described here.
One phrase stands out from the talk. I think it was Sir Howard Newby, the University Vice-Chancellor, who said.
Research is global.
This is so true and it is why places like CERN must exist.
On My Way To CERN
CERN is reached from the centre of Geneva by a number 18 tram, which ends its journey at the site. You can either pick this up at the main station or as I did at Bel-Air, which is a major tram interchange at the foot of the old town.
It was all very simple and civilised and took under thirty minutes.
A Visit To CERN
On Friday, I left the cold of London for hopefully better climes in Geneva.
The purpose of the visit was to go to CERN, the European Centre for Nuclear Research. The invite came from the Alumni Relations people at my old University of Liverpool. It was a full weekend, so I’m going to post things as they turn up. To give a taster of this visit, I’m posting this picture.
A Visit To CERN
This shows me in front of the CMS experiment. It is being rebuilt at the moment.
The picture was taken about a hundred metres underground the French countryside. That was a long climb back. But they did have a lift, which was cosy for the twenty-five or so in each party.
Richard Feynman
I’d never heard of Richard Feynman, before tonight, when BBC2 had a program about his work on the Enquiry into the Challenger Disaster and a profile of his life. Wikipedia says this about the report on Challenger.
He warned in his appendix to the commission’s report (which was included only after he threatened not to sign the report), “For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.”
It’s a wonderful quote and all politicians should have it tattooed on their bottom.
A New Superwheat
You’d think as a coeliac, I would not be in favour of the new superwheat developed at Cambridge as reported on the BBC.
British scientists say they have developed a new type of wheat which could increase productivity by 30%.
The Cambridge-based National Institute of Agricultural Botany has combined an ancient ancestor of wheat with a modern variety to produce a new strain.
But I think this is a victory for traditional high-class science. As I understand it, after hearing the scientist on the radio, the combining of the two plants was done using the sort of methods, that have been used for years. Albeit with some clever seed incubation. No direct manipulation of the genes was involved.
So as this could give a yield increase of 30%, what would happen if these methods were applied to the other staple crops of the world.
Sadly, the problem is that, the Cambridge route doesn’t make any money for the big corporations of this world, who feel that the GM route is much more profitable.
I am not totally against GM, but it has to be used ethically and where it is demonstrated that it the only way to create an important product, such as a new cancer drug.
Who Said This? – The Answer
Margaret Thatcher!
An article by Charles Clover, who would probably be described as an environmentalist, wrote the article in the Sunday Times entitled, “If only we still had Thatcher, the scientist and mother of cleaner energy”.
Or read this one in the Guardian or this one in the Independent.
But whatever, you say about Margaret Thatcher, she was a trained scientist and worked as one. Name another Prime Minister or President of any country, with those qualifications!
Who Said This?
This quotation is published in today’s Sunday Times.
It is possible that . . . we have unwittingly begun a massive experiment with the system of this planet itself
So who said it?
I’ll give you a clue, in that it was said in an address to the Royal Society, by someone who was tutored at Oxford University, by the Nobel Prize winner; Dorothy Hodgkin.
Was it an environmentalist like Lord Melchett or Jonathan Porritt, a scientist like David Bellamy or a politician like Al Gore or Caroline Lucas?
The answer is in today’s Sunday Times in an absolute must-read article.
I will post later, who said it.
In Search Of Lise Meitner
Lise Meitner is one of my heroes and as she was born in Vienna, I had to see if I could find her birthplace. She was supposedly born at 27, Kaiser Josef Strasse according to a web site I found.
This was the nearest I could find.
In Search Of Lise Meitner
I would assume that the house has been knocked down.
I’ve just looked from my home computer and I was looking in the wrong place.
I really should have taken it with me or searched for an Internet cafe.
