Physicists Francois Englert of Belgium and Peter Higgs of the United Kingdom were awarded the Noble Prize in Physics by The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in recognition of a theoretical brilliance that was vindicated by the particle’s discovery last year.
Known as “God particle”, the Higgs boson was discovered last year but was predicted to exist nearly 50 years ago by Englert and Higgs. Their theories explained what gives matter is mass and helped complete scientists’ understanding of the nature of all matter.
The universe is filled with Higgs boson. Atoms and parts of atoms move around, they interact with and attract Higgs boson to create clusters around them in varying numbers. Certain particles will attract larger clusters of Higgs bosons and the more of them a particle attracts, the greater its mass will be.
