Hofstadter's Butterfly Effect Confirmed

Hofstadter's Butterfly Effect Confirmed

Hofstadter's Butterfly, a complex pattern of the energy states of electrons that resembles a butterfly, has appeared in physics textbooks as a theoretical concept of quantum mechanics for nearly 40…
Higgs Decays To B-Quarks From CMS

Higgs Decays To B-Quarks From CMS

Finally the decay of Higgs bosons to b-quark pairs is emerging from LHC data, too. That decay mode is the highest-probability one - about four out of five Higgs bosons will prefer to yield b-quarks…
The Plot Of The Week - Pick Your Favourite μ

The Plot Of The Week - Pick Your Favourite μ

Supersymmetry, the extension of the Standard Model of particle physics that was once sold as an almost certain discovery that the LHC experiments would bump into upon starting to collect proton-…
CDF Memories, Circa 1992

CDF Memories, Circa 1992

In 1992 the top quark had not been discovered yet, and it did not make much sense for the CDF collaboration to have a full meeting devoted solely to it; rather, analyses targeting the search of the…
The Overconstrained Standard Model

The Overconstrained Standard Model

With the Higgs boson in the bag, the game called "global fit" that particle physicists have been playing for a couple of decades has changed significantly. The knowledge of the Higgs boson mass…
The Plot Of The Week - Z Plus Jets

The Plot Of The Week - Z Plus Jets

ATLAS has just produced a very nice new study of jet production in Z-boson events. I will describe a sample graph below, but before I do I find it useful to explain to the less knowledgeable among…