Make your own Higgs boson
Alumna Dr Victoria Martin will be showing attendees of Alumni Weekend 2015 how they can make their own Higgs Boson at home.
As an undergraduate, Professor Higgs was to Victoria an academic seen in the corridors of Kings Buildings, and his particle was heard of but not understood. Today she counts Peter Higgs as a friend and works in collaboration with scientists from all over the world at CERN to work towards understanding the fundamental physics of the universe.
An early passion
Dr Martin was hooked on physics early on. At school, she was fascinated by the science of what things were made up of, and loved the logic of physics. Chemistry initially held more interest, as that was the class where she learned about atoms and molecules.
Eventually it became clear that it's physicists that get to look inside atoms, so it was an easy choice to make in the end!
Science across continents
After completing her PhD at Edinburgh, Victoria stuck with Physics, and after completing a post-doc in North America, returned to lecture and continue her research. The diversity of colleagues and students at Edinburgh and around the world are a continuous highlight of her work.
We all have different skills, different motivations; but we've all decided to work together on the world's largest experiment.
Physics for the man on the street
Having spoken to a wide range of audiences about science, from school children to local and national newspapers and live national radio broadcasts, Victoria is convinced that most complex physics can be explained in layman’s terms.
Only the full mathematical explanation contains all of the details, complexity, and perhaps even the subtlety, of the physics. But you don't need necessarily need to be know all the details to appreciate and admire the science.
Dark matter
Victoria remarks that the publicity around the Higgs research has had the knock on effect of exciting the general public about their research. She adds that there is perhaps a perception that the Higgs Boson research is all that happens at CERN, when actually, much more work is ongoing looking at matter and anti-matter, and trying to better understand the dark matter in the universe.
Alumni weekend
Come along on Friday 5 June to hear more about how to make your own Higgs Boson, and much more. Alumni Weekend is your chance to hear from world leading academics as they share their current thinking and research. You’ll also be able to meet up with fellow alumni from all over the world and revisit old haunts from your student days.