Massive
Subtitle: the missing particle that sparked the greatest hunt in science
By: Ian Sample
Edition: 1st paperback ed.
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 2012
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 288
ISBN-13: 9780465058730
Copyright date: 2010
Subjects: Higgs bosons; Large Hadron Collider (France and Switzerland)
Description: This science story, the biggest of our time, spans four decades, weaving together the personal narratives and international rivalries behind the search for the "God particle," or Higgs boson. A story of grand ambition, intense competition, clashing egos, and occasionally spectacular failures, Massive is the first book that reveals the science, culture, and politics behind the biggest unanswered question in modern physics--what gives things mass? Drawing upon his unprecedented access to Peter Higgs, after whom the particle is named, science journalist Ian Sample chronicles the multinational and multibillion-dollar quest to solve the mystery of mass. For scientists, to find the God particle is to finally understand the origin of mass, and until now, the story of their search has never been told.--From publisher description.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Long road to Princeton; title: Shadow of the bomb; title: Seventy-nine lines; title: The enchanted prince; title: An earnest revenge; title: Reagan's renegade; title: Massive Maggie; title: The end is not nigh; title: The Gordian knot; title: Chasing the wind; title: Hidden world.