Footprint of 'God particle' found?

Source: The Hindu, July 3, 2012, Front page But after decades of work and billions of dollars spent, researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, aren't quite ready to say they've discovered the particle. Instead, experts familiar with the research in CERN's vast complex on the Swiss-French border say the massive data they have obtained will esentially show the footprint of the key particle known as the Higgs boson all but proving it exists but doesn't allow them to say it has actually been glimpsed. Senior CERN scientists say the two independent teams of physicists who plan to present their work on July 4 are about as close as you can get to a discovery without actually calling it one. I agree that any reasonable outside observer would say, 'It looks like a discovery,' British theoretical physicist John Ellis, a professor at King's College, London, who has worked at CERN since the 1970s, told The Associated Press. The discovery of the Higgs boson won't change people's lives, but will help explain the underpinnings of the universe. It world confirm the standard model of physics that explains why fundamental particles have mass. Those particles are the building blocks of the universe. The phrase God particle, coined by Nobel Prize-winning physicist Leon Lederman, is used by laymen, not physicists, more as an explanation for how the wonders of the subatomic universe work than how it all started. Rob Roser, who leads the search for the Higgs boson at the Fermilab in Chicago, said: Particle physicists have a very high standard for what it takes to be a discovery, and he thinks it is a hair's breadth away. Mr. Rosen compared the results that scientists are preparing to announce to finding the fossilized imprint of a dinosaur. You see the fooprints and the shoadow of the object, but you don't actually see it. Though an impenetrable concept to many, the Higgs boson has until now been just that a concept intended to explain a riddle How were the subatomic particles, such as electrons, protons and neutrons, themselves formed? What gives them their mass? The answer came in a theory first proposed by physicist Peter Higgs and others in the 1960s. It envisioned an energy field where particles interact with a key particle, the Higgs boson. The idea is that other particles attract Higgs boson and the more they atttract, the bigger their mass will be.

Elusive particle found, looks like Higgs boson

Source: The Hindu, July 5, 2012, Front page Scientists at the world's biggest atom smashing facility near Geneva claimed the discovery of a new sub-atomic particle on Wednesday. They found it to be consistent with the long-sought Higgs boson popularly known as the God particle that helps explain what gives size and shape to all matter in the universe. We have now found the missing cornerstone of particle physics, Rolf Heuer, Director of the European Centre for Nulear Research (CERN), told scientist amid cheers and standing ovation. As a layman, I think we did it, he said. We've a discovery. We've observed a new particle that is consistent with Higss boson.

The Higgs boson, which until now was theoretical particle, is seen as the key to understanding why matter has mass. It is mass that combines with gravity to give an object weight. The idea is much like gravity and Isaac Newton's discovery of it. Gravity existed even before Newton explained it. But now scientists see something much like the Higgs boson and can put that knowldege to further use. Two independent teams at CERN said they had both observed a new subatomic particle, a boson. Dr. Heuer called it most probably a Higgs boson, but we have to find out what kind of Higgs boson it is. Asked whether the find is a discovery, he answered: As a layman, I think we have it. But as a scientist, I have to say, 'What do we have?' Dr. Incandela, head of CMS with 2,100 scientists, said it was too soon to say definitively whether what has been discovered is indeed the standard model Higgs that Scottish physicist Peter Higgs and others predicted in the 1960s. They did that as part of a standard model theory of physics involving an energy field where particles interact with key particle, the Higgs boson. The Higgs or a Higgs that was the question on Wednesday. It is consistent with a Higgs boson as is needed for the standard model, Dr. Heuer said. We can only call it a Higgs boson, not the Higgs bonson. Dr. Incandela called it a Higgs-like particle, and said we know it must be a boson and it's the heaviest boson ever found. Dr. Gianotti, head of ATLAS with 3,000 scientists, said that the standard model [of physics] is not complete, the dream is to find an ultimate theory that explains everything, we are far from that. Dr. Incandela said the last undiscovered piece of the standard model could be a variant of the Higgs that was predicted, or something else that entirely changes the way scientists think of how matter is formed. This boson is a very profound thing we've found, he said. We're reaching into the fabric of the universe in a way we never have done before. We've kind of completed one particle's story... now, we're way out on the edge of exploration.

My understanding
Even though Peter Higgs and others have proposed a theory about a particle which may be responsible for the mass of other particles and eventually the universe in 1960s, building an instrument capable of finding atleast a small evidence about it, took nearly half-a-century and a huge cost of $10-billion. But what we get from this experiment according to the words of the team heads involved in this project is that, the so-called found particle is not 'the Higgs boson' but just a variety of Higgs boson. So, the experiment cannot be called a success or a failure, as it is just the beginning. As one boson is found, there is high probability of finding the predicted Higgs boson soon. Please note the words by some of the scientists quoted above in the article like:

consistent with Higgs boson it suggests the found particle is not the Higgs boson. It looks like a discovery for laymen, not physicists. Particle physicists have a very high standard for what it takes to be a discovery, it is a hair's breadth away. hair's breadth is a very big size for particle physicists. most propably a Higgs boson, but we have to find what kind of Higgs boson it is.\ a Higgs boson, not the Higgs boson could be a variant of the Higgs that was predicted, or something else that entirely changes the way scientists think of how matter is formed a Higgs-like particle