Why to create Higgs Boson in LHC ?

salil87

Hi
If the Higgs field is present everywhere then so should be the Higgs Boson right? Then why is a particle accelerator required. Cant it be just detected from around us?
Salil

mfb

Virtual Higgs bosons (as model to describe the field interaction), but not real ones (as particles). You need an accelerator to produce Higgs particles and observe their decays.

axemaster

That's sort of like saying that since the electromagnetic field permeates all of space, shouldn't space be filled with photons.

The answer is that according to the uncertainty principle, the energy of a particle or region of space becomes increasingly uncertain when you look at smaller and smaller time scales. This gives rise to the concept of "virtual" particles, which essentially "borrow" energy in order to exist very briefly before winking out of existence once again. Virtual particles do the important job of transmitting forces for the "real" particles, which come along when enough energy is available to support them.

The point of the LHC is to squeeze enough energy into a small enough space to create real Higgs Bosons, since virtual ones can't be detected directly.