Issued on behalf of MCVB

The recent, ground-breaking Higgs boson discovery announced in Melbourne at the 36th International Conference on High Energy Physics (ICHEP), has shed positive light on the city’s flourishing business events industry.

ICHEP, which has brought over 800 delegates to the city over an eight-day period and is expected to generate an estimated AUD $8 million in economic impact for the state, is the largest scientific gathering in the high energy physics community and was won after an intensive bidding process, facilitated by MCVB, dating back to 2005.

Chief Executive Officer of the Melbourne Convention + Visitors Bureau (MCVB), Karen Bolinger, said MCVB partnered with the University of Melbourne to bid for the 2012 Conference, with Professor Geoffrey Taylor, past Head of the School of Physics at the University of Melbourne as the representative local host.

“After a number of years of hard work in preparing Melbourne’s bid to bring the event to Victoria, Melbourne was announced as the successful bid city, fending off strong competition from Manchester, at the Philadelphia conference in 2008,” she said.

Although represented by a relatively small community in Australia (nationally the sector is dominated by Melbourne groups), high energy particle physics has always been at the forefront of technological development.

Melbourne University is a research powerhouse in the specialised areas of neurosciences, microbiology, pharmacology, and psychology/psychiatry and physics. The University is recognised as Australia’s leading institute in particle physics (both theoretical and experimental) and the intersection of particle physics with cosmology and high energy astrophysics.

Ms Bolinger said that as Australia’s knowledge, research and innovation capital, Melbourne was the obvious choice for hosting this event.

“MCVB specialises in bidding for major international conferences and conventions from the knowledge sectors.  There is strong competition from other conference cities when it comes to bidding for events of this calibre and a successful bid requires a combination of superior business events infrastructure and an innovative, knowledgeable and well-respected local industry, both areas of which our state excels.

“Over the next two and a half years, Melbourne will host seven of the world’s largest and most prestigious conferences including the World Diabetes Congress in 2013 and the World Congress of Cardiology and the International AIDS Conference in 2014, all of which have been secured by MCVB and are set to create long lasting legacies from almost every perspective.”

Ms Bolinger said there was still limited awareness of the beyond tourism benefits produced as a result of business events.

“Not only do business events generate economic wealth and export orders for the destination, they also: enhance industry sector profiles; encourage change and innovation; spark new research and technology; increase market intelligence; change perceptions of a city, a country or an industry; and assist in job creation.

“It is evident by the worldwide attention given to the Higgs boson breakthrough the significant impact these major events can have on a host city – history will always point to Melbourne as the city where this ground-breaking announcement took place.”

Ms Bolinger added that Melbourne is renowned for a strong culture of innovation through collaboration and it is this approach that continues to assist in winning major bids.

“The Victorian State Government is a strong advocate for the business events industry, facilitating its growth by providing support, and recognising the contribution that conferences make to furthering critical research on a global scale.

“The city’s commitment to attracting international conventions is also demonstrated by its Club Melbourne Ambassador (CMA) Program. This collaborative strategy, supported by the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, MCVB and the State Government of Victoria, brings together proud Melburnians in the fields of medicine, science, business and industry, who are passionate in their advocacy of Melbourne as an innovative ‘thinking’ city and desirable conference destination.”

The CMA program currently boasts 134 world leaders in their respective fields, including ICHEP Organising Committee Chair, Geoffrey Taylor.

“Without the support of local industry, groups and individuals such as our CMAs, we would not be equipped to achieve the level of success we currently do.

“Each year we look forward to welcoming our conference delegates to the city and watching as they showcase Melbourne’s expertise and help promote our wonderfully innovative and forward-thinking city to the world.”

 -Ends-

‘Evans the Atom’ and the future of atom-smashers Lyn Evans – the man behind the Large Hadron Collider

Lyn Evans, dubbed ‘Evans the Atom’ by the Welsh press, led the construction of the LHC. He was there to switch it on in 2008 and he was in Geneva last week to hear the results of its search.

He’s now working on designs for the next generation of atom-smashers as the International Committee for Future Accelerators considers sites in Japan, America, Russia and Western Europe.

William Trischuk – who reckons $10 million worth of diamonds is ‘dirt cheap’

New machines will have to cope with extreme heat and pressure. William is using diamonds to make new types of detectors for use in “extreme radiation conditions” in the LHC.

The search for dark matter – underground and out in space Now that the LHC has found the Higgs boson, scientists will use it to search directly for dark matter, as astrophysicists look into space to looks for evidence of its existence.

Mark Trodden – a self-described ‘particle cosmologist’

We know dark matter makes up the bulk of the universe, but we’re not sure why. We can’t see it, but we know it’s there. Understanding dark matter and dark energy will help us to understand gravity and the expansion of the universe.

Karen Gibson – who’s looking for dark matter in an abandoned gold mine

Karen’s putting a tank of freezing gas deep underground in an abandoned gold mine. She needs to block out all the background radiation and other particles so that she can recognise the signs of dark matter.

Press briefing details and background information We’re holding daily press briefings at 8am and 6pm.

All our press briefings are in Plenary 3, at the Melbourne Convention Centre, South Wharf. We are also hosting a media room upstairs for accredited media.

These press briefings and all of this week’s plenary sessions will be live-streamed at the conference press website if you can’t make it to the Melbourne Convention Centre. There’s no need to register for that – it will be freely available via the conference media website.

On the conference media website, http://press.highenergyphysicsmedia.com, we have: photos and videos of the Higgs announcement: abstracts and program timetables; background information; and copies of any press releases and briefing materials we put out.

And later this week, we’ll hear about: underground telescopes in Antarctica; charm quarks and charmonium; the possibility of multiple Higgs bosons; and leaders from CERN, Fermilab, KEK (Japan) and IHEP (China) will tell us what’s next – what we will be hearing about in two years, five years, ten years and beyond.

Media contact: Niall Byrne
+61 417 131 977
niall@scienceinpublic.com.au 

The first session is 6pm Sunday evening in New York, 10 pm Sunday evening in London, and 8 am Monday morning in Melbourne

The second session is 4 am Monday morning in New York, 8 am in London and 6 pm in Melbourne. 

Here’s a taste of what’s still to come:

• The next generation of particle accelerators are already being planned. The International Linear Collider will be able to search with more precision for the Higgs boson and other particles. Japan, Germany, Russia and America are vying to host it. Meanwhile, rival project the Compact Linear Collider is being planned at CERN.
  
• The unusual world of subatomic particles: Where charm quarks and charm antiquarks come together in charmonium. We’ve got people who can talk about muons, pions, kaons, and gluons; top quarks, bottom quarks, up and down quarks; as well as the more familiar photons, electrons, neutrinos and of course the Higgs boson.
  
• From the very big to the very small: Astrophysicists are looking out into space for clues about what happened in the first minutes after the Big Bang, while particle physicists make quark-gluon plasma – the “primordial soup” of the early universe – right here on Earth.
  
• The search for dark energy: We know it makes up the bulk of the universe, but we’re not sure why, and we’re building a new telescope to look for it around supernovae and black holes. Understanding dark energy will help us to understand gravity and the expansion of the universe.
  
• Underground telescopes and next-gen colliders: Hear about new labs being built in disused mines in Finland and South Dakota, installing cryogenic chambers in Italian and Chinese mountain caves and planning for a new generation of “compact” particle accelerators.
  
• Protecting scientists with diamonds: Scientists are developing a new array of sensor technologies – involving diamonds – for use in “extreme radiation conditions”.
  
• IceCube and ANTARES: A pair of telescopes buried under the South Pole and deep in the Mediterranean Sea looking for neutrinos as they pass through the planet, probing black holes at the centre of galaxies and helping in the search for dark matter.
  

Media briefings – live stream available The briefings will be live-streamed via CERN and are freely available via the conference media website –www.press.highenergyphysicsmedia.com/webcasts.

Follow the news as it breaks:
We’ll be tweeting on @pressichep, and you can follow the hashtag #ICHEP2012

Conference:
http://www.ichep2012.com.au
4–11 July, Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre

Key contact details:
Conference media director: Niall Byrne, +61 417 131 977, niall@scienceinpublic.com.au.

And for CERN stories contact their media representative at the conference: Renilde Vanden Broeck, 
+41 764 873 765, renilde.vanden.broeck@cern.ch

The historic scientific announcement was made via satellite from CERN to the University of Melbourne led global particle physics conference, The 36th International Conference on High Energy Physics (ICHEP2012) at the Melbourne Convention Centre. It is the first time the conference has been held in the Southern Hemisphere.

CERN and the Large Hadron Collider have iconic status in the world. Under Professor Heuer’s direction, the organisation has come to occupy a significant place in society as the embodiment of the human quest to understand the big questions.

Over more than two decades Australia has been part of these developments. The University of Melbourne has been particularly well served through Professor Heuer’s unwavering support for it’s high energy particle physics program, led by Professor Geoffrey Taylor in the School of Physics. 

This has opened many opportunities for Australian staff and students to be involved in the biggest physics experiments of our time.

The University of Melbourne Provost, Professor Margaret Sheil said the University recognised Professor Heuer’s leadership as Director–General of CERN in bringing the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) into operation, and for his support of the Australian physics community to fully participate in the LHC program.

“The University of Melbourne along with the ARC, has been proud to support the work of Professor Taylor and his team, and his leadership in the long-standing collaboration with CERN,” she said.

Professor Heuer said it was a great honour to accept this accolade from the University of Melbourne, particularly at this propitious moment in the history of particle physics.

“Just two days ago, we announced, in conjunction with this University, the discovery of a new particle that is set to have a profound influence on our understanding of the fundamental nature of matter,” he said

Professor Heuer is also the Chair of the International Advisory Committee of the University of Melbourne led ARC Centre of Excellence for Particle Physics at the Terascale (CoEPP).

“I would also like to underline the vital role that the University of Melbourne has played in developing the field of particle physics in Australia through initiatives such as the establishment of CoEPP and hosting this year's most important conference in the field, ICHEP2012," he said.

CoEPP, led by Professor Taylor, explores particle physics at terascale energies (a million million electron volts) through the ATLAS experiment, a giant particle detector attached to the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

Professor Taylor said the involvement of Professor Heuer in the ARC Centre reinforced the international standing of particle physics expertise in Australia

A Special Conferring of Degree Ceremony was held today at the University of Melbourne.

For media inquiries contact
Rebecca Scott, Senior Media Officer, University of Melbourne on 0417164791

Now, you have the opportunity to speak with scientists working on the frontiers of high-energy physics!

Join us for a public Google+ Hangout On Air this Saturday (July 7) at 12:00 Melbourne (AU) time straight from the International Conference on High-Energy Physics, where an auditorium of physicists will answer your questions about the Higgs boson, the Universe and everything. The session will be convened by Australia’s very own celebrity scientist Dr. Karl (http://www.drkarl.com/home/).

NOTE: You do NOT need a Google+ account in order to view this event. Just open the CERN G+ page, and the Hangout will appear on a video player when it is live!

To participate: Log in to Google+ and add CERN to your circles - http://cern.ch/go/8ZRk

When the Hangout is live, we will post a link to it so that you can join. Since there are limited places, we request that you ask your question and, once it has been answered, make place for another participant.

#Higgs #ICHEP2012 #ICHEP #Higgsteria #HiggsBoson #LHC #CERN #ATLAS #CompactMuonSolenoid #CMS

“We observe in our data clear signs of a new particle, at the level of 5 sigma, in the mass region around 126 GeV. The outstanding performance of the LHC and ATLAS and the huge efforts of many people have brought us to this exciting stage,”said ATLAS experiment spokesperson Fabiola Gianotti, “but a little more time is needed to prepare these results for publication.”

"The results are preliminary but the 5 sigma signal at around 125 GeV we’re seeing is dramatic. This is indeed a new particle. We know it must be a boson and it’s the heaviest boson ever found,” said CMS experiment spokesperson Joe Incandela. “The implications are very significant and it is precisely for this reason that we must be extremely diligent in all of our studies and cross-checks."

“It’s hard not to get excited by these results,” said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci. “ We stated last year that in 2012 we would either find a new Higgs-like particle or exclude the existence of the Standard Model Higgs. With all the necessary caution, it looks to me that we are at a branching point: the observation of this new particle indicates the path for the future towards a more detailed understanding of what we’re seeing in the data.”

The results presented today are labelled preliminary. They are based on data collected in 2011 and 2012, with the 2012 data still under analysis.  Publication of the analyses shown today is expected around the end of July. A more complete picture of today’s observations will emerge later this year after the LHC provides the experiments with more data.

The next step will be to determine the precise nature of the particle and its significance for our understanding of the universe. Are its properties as expected for the long-sought Higgs boson, the final missing ingredient in the Standard Model of particle physics? Or is it something more exotic? The Standard Model describes the fundamental particles from which we, and every visible thing in the universe, are made, and the forces acting between them. All the matter that we can see, however, appears to be no more than about 4% of the total. A more exotic version of the Higgs particle could be a bridge to understanding the 96% of the universe that remains obscure.

“We have reached a milestone in our understanding of nature,” said CERN Director General Rolf Heuer. “The discovery of a particle consistent with the Higgs boson opens the way to more detailed studies, requiring larger statistics, which will pin down the new particle’s properties, and is likely to shed light on other mysteries of our universe.”

Positive identification of the new particle’s characteristics will take considerable time and data. But whatever form the Higgs particle takes, our knowledge of the fundamental structure of matter is about to take a major step forward.

Science in Public is assisting with the media program at the conference. 

For interviews contact Niall Byrne on 0417 131 977 orniall@scienceinpublic.com.au or AJ Epstein on 0433 339 141, aj@scienceinpublic.com.au

“Physicists are not normally very effusive but we are at this time.

“This is a milestone for the physics community, and for human understanding of the fundamental laws that govern the universe.”

The discovery was announced at an event held at CERN, Geneva, and simulcast live to the international physics community which gathered in Melbourne tonight for the July 4 – 11 conference.

New data from ATLAS and CMS, two experiments independently looking for the Higgs boson and both underway at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC), was presented to conference attendees.

Both studies pointed to the existence of a previously unknown boson, consistent with the Higgs boson.

“As scientific discoveries go, this is up there with finding a way to split the atom,” Professor Taylor said.

“People have been working towards this for many years, and Australian groups have been part of this from the beginning so for the best part of 25 years.

“And to now be part of the reportage is a real privilege.”

Australian research and technology helped to build the ATLAS detector at the LHC, and of around 3000 researchers working at the facility at any one time there are around 30 Australians.

Data generated by the ATLAS experiment is also processed in Melbourne as part of an international grid of computer farms.

Australia’s involvement in the particle-smashing work at the LHC is co-ordinated by the ARC Centre of Excellence for Particle Physics at the Terascale (CoEPP) where Prof Taylor is also Director.

The CoEPP brings together particle physicists based in Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide.

Professor Ray Volkas, Director of CoEPP’s Melbourne node, described the discovery as a “triumph”.

"The discovery of this new particle at CERN, likely to be the Higgs boson or something closely related, cements our understanding of how the universe is put together,” Prof Volkas said.

“It is a triumph of the human ability to nut out nature using deep theoretical reasoning and amazingly skillful experiments.  Humans are capable of both great intelligence and great stupidity.

“This is a magnificent example of great intelligence, and represents the triumph of hope.

“More work needs to be done to know the exact properties of this particle.  Most of us hope that while it is related to the Higgs boson, it is not precisely the standard Higgs.

“A non-standard Higgs would point to the future, to a yet deeper understanding of the fundamental basis of the world." 

The search for the Higgs boson has occupied the minds of the world’s top physicists, and an array of increasingly powerful particle-colliding machines, since its existence was first theorised in the 1960s.

The theory proposes a “Higgs field” permeates the universe and it interacts with fundamental particles of matter to give them mass, though until now there was no conclusive proof this exists.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION The ARC Centre of Excellence for Particle Physics at the Terascale (CoEPP) was established in February 2011, to work on global endeavors in high energy physics, advanced computing and accelerator science.

The Australian Research Council’s funding commitment is $25 million over 7 years.

This currently supports the work of more than 20 senior investigators and 60 students or post-doctoral researchers.

Melbourne Node Director is Professor Ray Volkas, Monash Node Director is Associate Professor Csaba Balasz, Adelaide Node Director is Professor Anthony Thomas and Sydney Node Director is Associate Professor Kevin Varvell.

CoEPP Centre Director is Professor Geoff Taylor.

Register for ICHEP as press:

http://www.highenergyphysicsmedia.com

Follow the news as it breaks:

We’ll be tweeting on @pressichep, and you can follow the hashtag #ICHEP2012

Conference:

http://www.ichep2012.com.au

4–11 July, Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre

Key contact details:

Conference media director:

Niall Byrne, 0432 974 400, niall@scienceinpublic.com

CMS Search Strategy
CMS analysed the full data sample of proton-proton collisions collected in all of 2011 and in 2012, up until June 18. These data amount to up to 5.1 fb-1 of integrated luminosity[5], at a centre-of-mass energyof7TeVin2011andupto5.3fb-1 at8TeVin2012.
The standard model predicts that the Higgs boson lasts for only a very short time before it breaks up, or “decays”, into other well-known particles. CMS studied five main Higgs boson decay channels. Three channels result in pairs of bosonic particles (γγ, ZZ or WW) and two channels result in pairs of fermionic particles (bb or ττ), where γ denotes a photon, Z and W denote the force carriers of the weak interaction, b denotes a bottom quark, and τ denotes a tau lepton. The γγ, ZZ and WW channels are equally sensitive in the search for a Higgs boson around 125 GeV and all are more sensitive than the bb and ττ channels.
The γγ and ZZ channels are especially important as they both allow the mass of the new particle to be measured with precision. In the γγ channel the mass is determined from the energies and directions of two high-energy photons measured by the CMS crystal electromagnetic calorimeter (ECAL, Figure 1). In the ZZ channel the mass is determined from the decays of the two Zs to two pairs of electrons, or two pairs of muons, or a pair of electrons and a pair of muons (Figure 2). These are measured in the ECAL, inner tracking and muon detectors.

The WW channel is more complex. Each W is identified through its decay to an electron and a neutrino or a muon and a neutrino. The neutrinos pass through the CMS detectors undetected, so the SM Higgs boson in the WW channel would manifest itself as a broad excess in the mass distribution, rather than a narrow peak. The bb channel has large backgrounds from standard model processes, so the analysis searches for events in which a Higgs boson is produced in association with a W or Z, which then decays to electron(s) or muon(s). The ττ channel is measured by observing τ decays to electrons, muons and hadrons.

CMS Results Summary
The CMS data sample should be sensitive enough to completely exclude the mass range 110–600 GeV at 95% confidence level, if the SM Higgs does not exist. In fact, the CMS data do rule out the existence of the SM Higgs boson in two broad mass ranges of 110–122.5 GeV and 127–600 GeV with 95% confidence level.
The range of 122.5–127 GeV cannot be excluded because we see an excess of events in three of the five channels analysed:
•    γγ channel: the γγ mass distribution is shown in Figure 3. There is an excess of events above background with a significance of 4.1 sigma, at a mass near 125 GeV. The observation of the two-photon final state implies that the new particle is a boson, not a fermion, and that it cannot be a “spin 1” particle.
•    ZZ channel: Figure 4 shows the mass distribution for the four leptons (two pairs of electrons, or two pairs of muons, or the pair of electrons and the pair of muons). Accounting also for the decay angle characteristics, it yields an excess of 3.2 sigma above background at a mass near 125 GeV.
•    WW channel: a broad excess in the mass distribution of 1.5 sigma is observed. •    bb and ττ channels: no excess is observed.

The mass of the new particle is determined to be 125.3 +/- 0.6 GeV, independent of any assumptions about the expected relative yields of the decay channels. The measured production rate (σDAT) of this new particle is consistent with the predicted rate (σSM) for the SM Higgs boson: σDAT/σSM = 0.80 +/- 0.22.
Great care has also been taken to understand numerous details of the detector performance, the event selection, background determinations and other possible sources of systematic and statistical uncertainties. The 2011 analysis[6] showed an excess of events at about 125 GeV. Therefore, to avoid a potential bias in the choice of selection criteria for the 2012 data that might artificially enhance this excess, the 2012 data analysis was performed “blind”[7], meaning that the region of interest was not examined until after all the analysis criteria had been fully scrutinized and approved.

As a general cross-check, the analyses were performed by at least two independent teams. A number of other features reinforce confidence in the results:
•    The excess is seen at around 125 GeV in both the 2011 data sample (7 TeV) and the 2012 data sample (8 TeV);
•    The excess is seen at the same mass in both the high-resolution channels (γγ and ZZ); •    The excess seen in the WW is consistent with one that would arise from a particle at 125 GeV; •    The excess is seen in a range of final states involving photons, electrons, muons and hadrons.
The preliminary results presented today will be refined, with the aim of submitting them for publication towards the end of the summer.

Future plans
The new particle observed at about 125 GeV is compatible, within the limited statistical accuracy, with being due to the SM Higgs boson. However, more data are required to measure its properties such as decay rates in the various channels (γγ, ZZ, WW, bb and ττ) and ultimately its spin and parity, and hence ascertain whether it is indeed the SM Higgs boson or the result of new physics beyond the standard model.

The LHC continues to perform extremely well. By the end of 2012, CMS expects to more than triple its total data sample, and hence to probe further the nature of this new particle. If this particle is indeed the SM Higgs boson, its properties and implications for the standard model will be studied in detail. If it is not the SM Higgs boson, CMS will explore the nature of the new physics that it implies, which may include additional particles that are observable at the LHC. In either case, searches will also continue for other new particles or forces that can be observed in future runs of the LHC at higher beam energies and intensities.

About CMS
More information: http://cern.ch/cms or contact: cms.outreach@cern.ch.
CMS is one of two general-purpose experiments at the LHC that have been built to search for new physics. It is designed to detect a wide range of particles and phenomena produced in the LHC's high- energy proton-proton and heavy-ion collisions and will help to answer questions such as: "What is the Universe really made of and what forces act within it?" and "What gives everything mass?" It will also measure the properties of well-known particles with unprecedented precision and be on the lookout for completely new, unpredicted phenomena. Such research not only increases our understanding of the way the Universe works, but may eventually spark new technologies that change the world in which we live as has often been true in the past.

The conceptual design of the CMS experiment dates back to 1992. The construction of the gigantic detector (15 m diameter by nearly 29 m long with a weight of 14000 tonnes) took 16 years of effort from one of the largest international scientific collaborations ever assembled: 3275 physicists (including 1535 students) plus 790 engineers and technicians, from 179 institutions and research laboratories distributed in 41 countries all over the world.