Nobel prize winner to explain the ‘God-particle'

Physics Nobel Laureate Professor Gerard ’t Hooft will discuss the elusive Higgs particle or ‘God-particle’, which is believed to be responsible for the origin of mass, at the University of Southampton next month.

Professor ’t Hooft will be giving the keynote lecture for the University’s Southampton Theory Astrophysics and Gravity (STAG) Research Centre on Wednesday 1 October at 2.30pm.

He will discuss how a recent discovery at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva, is most likely the long-sought Higgs particle. He will explore how the particle behaves and what particles we should be looking for next to understand the building blocks of our Universe.

STAG Director, Professor Chris Sachrajda, says: “It is a tremendous privilege to have Professor ’t Hooft delivering our keynote address. Fundamental questions about our Universe have been asked for thousands of years and I look forward to hearing Professor ’t Hooft’s insights.â€?

The STAG Research Centre brings together world-leading academics from three research groups – Theoretical Particle Physics, Astronomy and General Relativity – to improve our understanding of the Universe and the fundamental laws of nature.

Researchers are exploring issues of fundamental physics and astronomy such as the ultimate building blocks of matter; extreme environments generated by black holes and neutron stars, which power some of the most spectacular phenomena in the Universe; and the identity of dark matter and dark energy, which make up 95 per cent of the Universe.

To book your free tickets for the talk, which is taking place at Turner Sims on the University’s Highfield campus, please follow the link above.