Breakthrough Prize 2025

Context

The 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics was together awarded to four experimental collaborations operating at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC)—ATLAS, CMS, ALICE and LHCb.

Key Highlights

The 4 collaborations studied the Higgs boson, considered as standard as electrons, photons or neutrinos. 

Breakthrough Prizes

• The Breakthrough Prizes had been founded by Sergey Brin, Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg, Yuri and Julia Milner, and Anne Wojcicki.
• The Prizes regularly known as the “Oscars of Science,” honour pioneering achievements in Life Sciences, Fundamental Physics, and Mathematics.
• Aim: Celebrate scientists as societal heroes, inspire the youth closer to science, and promote “science for the gain of all.”

India’s Role in Global Collaboration

• Indian scientists have played a significant position in the international collaboration for the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) and the CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) experiments.
• Contribution to ALICE: It specializes in studying the Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP), a state believed to have existed quickly after the Big Bang.
• Contribution to CMS: Indian establishments have contributed to detector development, software gear, and data analysis for the CMS experiment, which was vital within the discovery of the Higgs boson.

Large Hadron Collider (LHC)

• The LHC is the world’s biggest and maximum effective particle accelerator, enabling high-energy proton and heavy-ion collisions to explore the structure of depend on the smallest scales.
• It’s a 27-kilometer tunnel-like ring built at CERN.
• CERN: The European Organization for Nuclear Research, called CERN, was set up in 1954 in Geneva (France–Switzerland border).

India–CERN Partnership

• 1991: Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) signed the primary cooperation settlement with CERN.
• 2002: India awarded Observer state at CERN.
• 2009: MoU signed to enlarge cooperation in detector technology, computing, HR education, and joint research.
• 2017: India became an Associate Member State of CERN.

Source: The Hindu

UPSC Prelims Practice Question

Q. The efforts to detect the existence of Higgs boson particle have become frequent news in the recent past. What is/are the importance of discovering this particle?

1. It will enable us to understand as to why elementary particles have mass.
2. It will enable us in the near future to develop the technology of transferring matter from one point to another without traversing the physical space between them.
3. It will enable us to create better fuels for nuclear fission.

Select the correct answer using the codes given below:

(a) 1 only

(b) 2 and 3 only

(c) 1 and 3 only

(d) 1, 2 and 3

Ans: (a)

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