Things you can find in Switzerland

The Cuckoo Clock

Although the Cuckoo Clock is traditionally associated with Switzerland, it was originally made and developed in the Black Forest area of Germany.

Swiss Cuckoo Clocks generally take the form of the Bearnaise Chalet.

 The Edelweiss:

Some say the unofficial flower of Switzerland, a flower popularized by Julie Andrews in 'The Sound of Music', a musical  generally loved by old ladies world wide.

The Edelweiss was said to be Adolf Hitler's favourite flower.

The Pop legend that is'Phil Collins'

The Matterhorn

A very very pointy mountain often covered by snow and climbers with an unresolved death wish.

Swiss Chocolate

"Mmmm stuffed crust"

The Grosser Schweizer Sennenhund

Nice dogs but probably dangerous.

The Swiss Army Knife Enigma.

Why does a country with such a long history of neutrality and with such an admirable army, which takes part only in worldwide peace keeping activities, have such a predilection for pocket knives?  Do they use them for carving cuckoo clocks or cubing the cheese for fondue?

The Higgs Boson

The thing is, the press release from Cern is a bit reserved, so has evidence for the Higgs Boson been discovered by The Large Hadron Collider or not?  Well two experiments have produced evidence for a new particle in the mass region of 125-126 GeV.  The scientists know it is a boson and it is the heaviest boson found to date.


My limited understanding of why any of this is important ( Chad Valley Particle Physics):

Our understanding of the fabric of the universe is based upon The Standard Model developed by theoretical scientists in this and the last centuries. The current model requires the existence of  a fundamental particle which enables the transfer of mass. If it is shown not to exist, then a new standard model for 'Life, the Universe and Everything', will have to be developed.  This would represent an enormous set back for particle physics and our understanding of the science of everything. That's why finding it is such a big deal!

Elementary particles are classified either Bosons or Fermions.  Bosons and Fermions have very different properties.  Fermions (eg. electrons, quarks....) obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle ie. no two fermions can occupy the same quantum state and have half integral spin (angular momentum) 1/2,3/2,....  Bosons (eg. photons and gluons....) do not  obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle, have integral spin  ie. 0,1,2..... and  can but not always carry forces.



In nature there are four currently known forces; the strong nuclear, the electromagnetic, weak nuclear and gravitational. The forces are carried by particles 'bosons', which act upon  other particles 'fermions'. 


Electromagnetic fields, for instance, depend on the photon to transmit electromagnetic force to matter. Physicists think the Higgs boson might have a similar function -- but transferring mass itself.  The Higgs Boson  if it exists, is considered the carrier particle integral to the transfer of mass in the Higgs field, which is thought to permeate the whole Universe. 
or more information on the Higgs Boson see:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIg1Vh7uPyw&feature=related



Note of caution:
I remember  'the discovery of cold fusion', which was later found to be a chemical effect, the press release when NASA thought they had found evidence for extraterrestrial life in a martian meteorite, which turned out to be inorganic carbon, and generally whenever I start banging on about particle physics Toot starts singing "When Goldilocks went to the house of the bears......"