By Mario Campanelli
World Scientific
Also available at the CERN bookshop
In this concise book, Mario Campanelli provides an overview of particle-physics research at CERN. He starts with an introduction about the history of this branch of science, tracing the steps of its evolution through speculative theories and experimental proofs, up to the completion of the Standard Model puzzle with the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012. It is hard to condense – and explain in relatively simple terms – all of this complex material. As a consequence, the first section of the book should be considered by particle-physicist readers as a brief summary of known concepts, while by non-experts in the field as a very quick overview of the basics of particle physics.
The following chapters focus on CERN, home to the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). After a short account of the history of the laboratory concerning the different accelerators and relative detectors that followed one another, the author discusses the challenges that scientists had to face to design, construct and commission the LHC – a giant, complex and technologically advanced apparatus. He explains how the machine works, from the superconducting magnets to the acceleration phases (realised consecutively in different pre-accelerators and, finally, in the collider) and the beam extraction, showing that the LHC is a marvel of engineering. No less important, of course, are the detectors, which are necessary to study the products of collisions for different research purposes. A chapter is then dedicated to describing the experimental apparatus of the four main experiments: ATLAS, CMS, ALICE and LHCb.
The reader is also given an idea of how data are selected, stored and analysed to extract interesting information, as well as of the physics topics that are investigated by these experiments, including the Standard Model (SM), quantum chromodynamics, b-quark and top-quark physics, supersymmetry and any sign of new physics. The latter is what physicists working at CERN are really eager to find – particles or phenomena that could enable theorists to go beyond the SM. A chapter is dedicated to the discovery of the Higgs boson – the most important result accomplished with the LHC up to now.
Since such a great endeavour cannot be realised without hard work, professionalism and collaboration, the author highlights the importance of the human factor in such a varied, multicultural and highly competitive environment. Finally, a few paragraphs on the impact of high-energy physics research on industry and society conclude the book.
Written in a fluid style, this book would appeal to those who, even if not completely unfamiliar with the topic, know little about collider physics, CERN and its experiments.
