By S Nadis and S T Yau
International Press of Boston
The volume presents the reasons behind the ambitious project pursued by a group of distinguished Chinese scientists, led by Shing-Tung Yau, professor of mathematics and physics at Harvard University, to build the next biggest particle collider in China, to continue the quest to identify the fundamental building blocks of nature.
The discovery of the Brout–Englert–Higgs boson put in place the long-sought-after missing piece of the Standard Model of particle physics. Although this model can describe the behaviour of particles with remarkable accuracy, it is actually incomplete, because it is not able to explain a range of phenomena.
Several centuries ago, Chinese emperors erected a majestic ring of fortification – the Great Wall. Today, Chinese researchers are contributing to particle physics with a project of almost comparable magnificence: the building of a giant accelerator, the Great Collider.
The book explains the scientific issues at stake, discusses the history of particle physics, and tells the story of the birth and development of the Great Collider project.
