High energy/particle physics

High energy/particle physics

Main article: Particle physics

A simulated event in the CMS detector of the Large Hadron Collider, featuring a possible appearance of the Higgs boson.

Particle physics is the study of the elementary constituents of matter and energy, and the interactions between them. It may also be called "high energy physics", because many elementary particles do not occur naturally, but are created only during high energy collisions of other particles, as can be detected in particle accelerators.
Currently, the interactions of elementary particles are described by the Standard Model. The model accounts for the 12 known particles of matter (quarks and leptons) that interact via the strong, weak, and electromagnetic fundamental forces. Dynamics are described in terms of matter particles exchanging gauge bosons (gluons, W and Z bosons, and photons, respectively). The Standard Model also predicts a particle known as the Higgs boson, the existence of which has not yet been verified; as of 2010, searches for it are underway in the Tevatron at Fermilab and in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.