The Road to Grand Unified Theory

What role does the Higgs Mechanism play in the separation of weak interactions?

As is well known, the so-called Higgs Mechanism is actually an important theory in the Standard Model. It explains why some Elementary Particle have mass while others do not; it is the mechanism that gives particles mass.

This mechanism involves a field called the Higgs Field, which is ubiquitous throughout the universe and imparts mass to particles through spontaneous symmetry breaking.

According to Gauge Field Theory, including Yang-Mills Theory, to unify the Electroweak Force within the framework of Gauge Field Theory, it is necessary to assume that the W and Z Boson are initially massless, and that their mass is acquired through environmental factors.

This is the Higgs Mechanism that everyone is familiar with.

The process of going from having no quality to having quality is the process of symmetry breaking.

Once the three propagators of the Weak Force, the positive and negative W Boson and the Z Boson, have mass, their range of influence cannot even extend beyond the Atomic Nucleus, making the Weak Interaction Force a completely short-range force.

Its effective range is only 10 to the power of negative 18 meters, which is one-thousandth the length of a proton. Electromagnetic Force, on the other hand, is a long-range force, and its propagating photon has zero mass.

In other words, as long as the mass of the propagator of the Weak Force is also zero, its manifestation will become a long-range force, just like the Electromagnetic Force. This is the moment of unification of the Electroweak Force.

So, under what circumstances can the mass of the Weak Force propagator be zero? The answer is obvious: when gauge field symmetries are not broken. If Higgs Field symmetries are not broken, the Higgs Mechanism does not take effect, and the Weak Force propagator will not acquire mass.

The key factor in symmetry breaking depends on temperature.

If the temperature is high enough, the Higgs Mechanism will fail, symmetry breaking will not occur, the W and Z Boson will not acquire mass, and the Electromagnetic Force and the Weak Interaction Force will behave exactly the same. At this point, the propagator speed of the Weak Interaction Force will also Turn into Light, and like the Electromagnetic Force, it will propagate infinitely through the universe.

The Standard Particle Model predicts that the critical temperature at which the Higgs Mechanism fails, which is the critical temperature at which the Electromagnetic Force and the Weak Interaction Force are unified into one force, is 100 GeV.

Human-made Particle Collider are capable of reaching this energy level, thus successfully simulating the unification of Electromagnetic Force and Weak Interaction Force, and thus successfully unifying these two forces.

Now, Liu Miyan's idea is to continue using the Standard Model approach to unify the Strong Interaction Force, making the three forces into one, so that humanity can turn the Grand Unified Theory into reality, making it a theory that humanity can master, just like the Electroweak Theory.

So how do we incorporate the Strong Interaction? First, we need to understand what the Strong Interaction Force is. The Strong Force is responsible for binding protons and neutrons together in the Atomic Nucleus. In any Atomic Nucleus, all protons are positively charged. Without the Strong Force, they would be repelled by Electromagnetic Force, causing the Atomic Nucleus to break apart.

In other words, it Strong Force overcomes the repulsive force between protons, binding them within the Atomic Nucleus.

This phenomenon explains why there are only about 100 known elements in nature, because once the number of protons in Atomic Nucleus exceeds 100, the repulsive force between them becomes so strong that even the Strong Force cannot suppress it.

The Strong Force propagator is the Gluon. Unlike the Weak Force propagator, it has zero mass and therefore travels at the speed of light, just like the Electromagnetic Force propagator. However, unlike the weak propagator, the Strong Force propagator Gluon is trapped between Quark and cannot escape.

This is known as Quark Confinement. The farther apart Quark are, the stronger the Strong Interaction Force becomes; the closer they are, the weaker it becomes. Therefore, the closer Quark are, the freer they are. This phenomenon is called asymptotic freedom.

Therefore, it can be seen from this that in order to unify the Strong Interaction Force, its propagators must break through the Quark level and become a long-range force like the Electromagnetic Force.

Following this line of thought, the next step is to find a way to make the Strong Force propagator break through the Quark. So how can we make the Strong Force propagator break through the Quark level? The answer remains temperature.

The Standard Model infers that when the ambient energy is above 10 to the power of 15 GeV, Quark will no longer be bound by Gluon, Quark Confinement and asymptotic freedom will disappear, and Gluon will be able to escape from atoms at the speed of light. In this way, the Strong Force becomes a long-range force.

In this context, scientists can collect various data and then, following the methods of perfecting scientific theories, achieve a Strong Force unification, enabling humanity to grasp the Grand Unified Theory.

Of course, in this case, atoms would not exist.

How do we know that 10 to the power of 15 GeV is the critical point?

This brings us back to what we discussed earlier: the universe doesn't distinguish between up and down, front and back, but it does distinguish between left and right, and of course, there's also Quantum Chromodynamics.

When humanity, guided by the belief that brute Miracles Through Brute Force, forcibly smashed Proton Neutron, and even blasted apart Quark, it discovered that the energy required to break apart Quark was precisely the energy needed for the formation of new Quark.

So, as soon as the Quark are knocked apart, the energy instantly forms new Quark pairs, and the Color Charge of these two newly formed Quark combinations happens to be white. This is because Quantum Chromodynamics stipulates that the total Color Charge of Quark can only be white, that is, the color charge in color.

Thus, Gluon transmit the Strong Force in new pairs of quarks and Quark.

It was like hitting a brick wall and getting nowhere.

Of course, it's not entirely lonely; at least this phenomenon has drawn the attention of scientists, who have noticed that quarks and Quark do not annihilate it.

In people's understanding, Antimatter will definitely annihilate each other when they come together, and that is indeed the case. However, when Quark pairs stick together, they do not annihilate each other.

That's amazing.

Humanity naturally wants to understand why this phenomenon occurs. In fact, thanks to the efforts of countless scientists, the reasons behind it have been clarified.

That is Chiral Symmetry.

Scientists have discovered that as long as positive Quark and Quark possess Chiral Symmetry, that is, Chiral Symmetry holds, they will annihilate each other.

Conversely, if Chiral Symmetry is broken, they will not annihilate. Then, according to Quantum Chromodynamics, we know that because Gluon color charge is required, quarks and Quark will come together, and the energy that brings them together is the binding energy between Quark.

The universe is not divided into up and down, front and back, but into left and right; that is the wonder of the universe.

This process is called Chiral Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking. The binding energy generated by this phenomenon accounts for 99% of the mass of protons and neutrons. Yes, at the Quark level, the binding energy manifests as the mass of Proton Neutron.

This is the source of quality in everything we see every day.

So now it is obvious that Liu Miyan's goal is to obtain a more powerful collider, so that humans can create a 10 to the 15th power GeV energy level in the laboratory, recreating the environment when the Chiral Symmetry of the universe was not broken at the time of the Big Bang, and then study what it is like when the Strong Force or the long-range force is combined, what it is like when the three forces are combined, what the specific physical manifestations are, and so on. In this way, he can explore and master the Grand Unified Theory.

Science is an experimental discipline; without experiments and data, there will be no progress. The threshold for understanding the laws of the universe is not so low that Ork Logic.

Yu Nanfeng knew all this, so he understood Liu Miyan's demands, and for that reason, he didn't know what to say. He also wanted to say that humanity could build such a collider, and he would like to see humanity possess an even more powerful collider, but the current technological capabilities didn't allow it!