By T Eguchi and M Y Han (eds)
World Scientific
Hardback: £45
E-book: £23
Seeds for many developments in contemporary particle physics were sown by Yoichiro Nambu in his lectures and papers in the 1960s and 1970s – in particular, his work on the mechanism of spontaneous broken symmetry, for which he was to receive the Nobel prize. Tackling first the problem of maintaining gauge invariance in a field theory of superconductivity, he went on to develop these ideas in field theories for elementary particles, in particular inspiring the important work that led to the Brout–Englert–Higgs (BEH) mechanism for generating mass through spontaneous symmetry breaking in the Standard Model. These developments culminated at CERN in July 2012 (not 2011, World Scientific please note) with the discovery of an appropriate scalar particle – a Higgs boson. This book collects together the important papers related to this story and much more, some never published before in book form. The text is not only of historical value, but also provides a window into the mind of a man that many refer to as “Nambu the seer”. It is a valuable resource for researchers in elementary particle theory, and for those who are interested in the history of modern physics.
