Episode 27 – Dr. Florian Goertz

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human experience is colliding particles at nearly the speed of light with my guest night dr. florian guards florian it’s such a pleasure to have you with us welcome hellos any other nice to talk to you lorien let’s just start this conversation by going over a little bit of your education in your background how did you get to working at CERN um so first I studied physics in Germany and mines that’s a molests small city are in the regional frankfurt so south west

germany i obtained my PhD from my university after getting my master there then i went as a postdoc postdoctoral researcher I went to Switzerland to eth zurich were spent three years to search a little bit of teaching and then i applied for fellowship at CERN and in last year october i started working here in the series department of sir so my physics is lackluster at best I mean I’m I’m pretty good at math but we’re gonna I think we’re gonna have to simplify for

and make it a little bit entertaining for the people who are listening what exactly is going on at cern’s I mean what are you guys doing over there I mean one thing that was also media quite by present was the discovery of the Higgs boson so I mean we were searching for the particle for four decades also that the former accelerated the former would because accelerator was divested formula what people were searching for it and here its own we

finally found the Higgs boson three years ago and this was really a big step in the understanding of universe because this particle was the last missing ingredient for the model that we call the Standard Model of particle physics which is as far as we know the best description of the most fundamental properties of nature that we have so far can you tell us more about this takes both I mean why is it so important yeah exactly i mean without this exposé on or

without this mechanism where they exposed on emerges family all particles all elementary particles would be massless there would be no i mean it’s very hard to to consistently give mast particles and the Higgs mechanism provides one mechanism to do so consistently in the theory and we would not have found that bottom we would have been puzzled and would have needed to see in further what gives master particles because without mass for

elementary particles the universe as we see it now could not exist so it’s really very basic fundamental science understanding why why we are all here without without such a mechanism I mean that we would not have life as we have at Iran worse so would you would you call this the greatest mean scientific discovery known to man um it’s suddenly one of the greatest discoveries I mean it’s having found that mechanism is probably not important to our everyday

life so I mean without knowing this precise mechanism we could live as with knowing it but it was one of the biggest mysteries in our field how we can give really get really good master particles in a consistent way and there were a model for doing this proposed by a bunch of people in the 1960s so it was 50 years ago that this mechanism was proposed by peter higgs and others who share the mobile price also recently together with conspiring that and I mean

it’s really it’s really amazing that 50 years ago such a mechanism was proposed and fifty years later we build the biggest experiment that mankind has ever built here and soand with a large hadron collider and we could now more or less certainly very finest mechanism I mean we could verify this mechanism for sure but there are still details if it’s really the Higgs boson is it was thought to be of their small Yong Yong this particle that’s also kind of my research

I tried to find out if this is particle that we found you it’s really the one that was proposed to 50 years ago or if Burke that’s more more interesting things going order on this you know there’s there seems to be this wide range of canvassing opinions about you know what you guys are doing and you know Shiva as sort of the mascot of CERN and and there there are a lot of sort of religious people who think that there could be a wormhole that opens up or a

black hole or something I mean how valid are these concerns I mean these concerns about black holes we were taken seriously and they even have been been studies on that so okay fortunately in the first run of the lmc with which already finished we didn’t create a wormhole and was also not really expected so now we are getting to higher energies but I think we can can be relieved because there are mean there are serious arguments against the

emergence of Obama so let me say for black holes or imply cool let me say for one minute I’m why people thought that they could be black holes at the LHC the reason is that we have this model that I was mentioning the standard model but we think that it will be not valid anymore once we reach a certain energy regimes and then there are proposals how this most fundamental model of nature could be extended and then some of these

proposals the Planck scale so like the fundamental scale of gravity were also the spacetime needs to be changed would already appear at energy said we could prop here so it’s very special models that predict that something really extreme could happen at this energy so in our standard models nothing like that would happen but we can be relieved because there are various arguments against the creation of a black hole here one of them is for example in the

cosmic radiation that hits our us all the time we also have very energetic collisions Kaylee it’s just that we don’t have so many collisions at the time but we have these very energetic collisions and for example we would have be seen already an event like that before if it could happen so I mean it has been taken seriously but many experts in the field have found out that we will not create a black hole vot LFC also when we turn it on again so I mean

have you guys fired it up again since the first time now I you know we’re just the preparation for the next long run so there was a long shot on because we needed to to prepare the machine for the running now at higher energies before we were running at seven tera electron volt or a terror electron volt which and now we will model is double the energy and there we needed some preparation to do that but now the the machine people are

just putting it again work and first collisions are about to happen right now so on Easter day one is to the man you can do to set up the machine to inject the beams and our first physics this will take some time but now it’s we’re just as we speak just people are working to to set it up again okay very interesting so I mean you talk about the standard model of nature and reality what I mean what is that can you go into that a little bit more please yes sure I

mean um we have I mean we see around us isn’t matter and I mean the what things are made of yeah i mean the the atoms these are made of out of matter particles like protons and neutrons and this consists of of i mean this is what you also learn in school and this consists of even more fundamental particles so protons and neutrons consists of quarks perhaps your we heard about that is a little bit strange name but this is this is what we

think now is the most fundamental constituent of the matter yeah I like like the desk i’m sitting in front of it it’s made out of atoms protons neutrons and the most fundamental particles are box this has been discovered I mean we are sure that they exist but for example we don’t know if there could be something even more fundamental but at this level with the quirks this the power matter is described this is done in the Standard Model of particle

physics we we assume that the most fundamental metal particles are these quirks and also the leptons this is another other kind of particles like electrons that are running around and around the protons to form atoms so this is the matter part yeah and then there are the forces so all these these metal particles interact and the interact with forces and forces also described by particles for example you know the electromagnetic force ya like like a

magnetic force of electric forces this one it’s the same thing 220 time and this is mediated by the exchange of photons and this is described how this really how this behaves for the interaction strength is and how all the particles William ject is described by this theory which is called a tunnel model of particle physics this it has three more two more courses that are described in it this is the weak force which mediates nuclear decays I know it

was a strong force which which makes atoms I mean the constituents Warspite together in the in the nucleus so these are the three forces that are described by this by the Standard Model of particle physics but there’s a force force force gravity that everyone knows about this is not described by this model so this is not not such a big problem because gravity is very weak so the standard model describes the other three forces that be nomination but for

example one thing we are after also trying to find the bigger theory that also in depth gravity as a force for so we know already constitute too many other reasons at the standard model is not the final answer it’s a model that we now use to describe particle physics at the most fundamental level but there are more reasons that we think that if we go to very very small distances probe really mostly elementary nature nature that then we need a new

model finally which will replace this model so my understanding of of this big device I mean it’s this huge machine underground the earth and it’s it’s like a big gun right electromagnetic gun that’s firing these protons at themselves and they’re colliding and then you’re observing the collision correct right right i mean we inject two beams of protons here and they will collide at certain points on these rings of a circle and opposite directions

through the string through the LHC and they will collide and then we they are very energetic because they will be accelerated all the time to nearly the speed of light and then they will have really large large energy and then they will collide and you can imagine up like a very very big Michael sculptor so you know with an optical microscope for example you can magnify things you can look into details but if you wouldn’t want to to probe really smaller

distances to look closer and closer and closest you need them to go to electron microscope and the LHC is really you can magnify this by orders of magnitude then we go to the LHC so you like the biggest microscope that we have on earth we can really look so deep into the matter and look what is going on on the most fundamental level really what what binds the words and i was called together this is really the question we want to

address here and therefore we need to build this really really really large machine to accelerate this proton so far that we can really look into the smallest distances what’s really interesting so yeah that is very interesting so since I mean since you guys have already found the Higgs boson then what what in your opinion would be the next remark most remarkable thing that you could find from this search this is a very good question I mean if

this is also shapes also a field blue shape our field what we will discover next and so because you know we knew before mean before we built the LHC that we need to find something here here if we would not have found the Higgs boson we were sure we would find something else we had kind of a no-lose serum and the reason was that we knew the Standard Model of particle physics and I was mentioning so many times already would not be complete without this Higgs boson

and if you take it away from it it will break down in certain energies and here at the LHC will just build this machine at this energy that we really can can test this energy is where the standard model would break down without the exponent so now the Higgs boson will emerge we found it here so so we know the standard model will be valid at least for some some more regime and energies but the difficult thing is really that it’s difficult to find

another no loose serum yeah so for the LHC we really knew either we will find the Higgs boson or something else for the next machine so we are really also hoping that there will be new kaleidos after the LFC we are thinking hard really um to really make the point what we need to discover so while we’re building this machines and there are many many reasons that we think the stunna bonus not to find you one I was already mentioning was that it doesn’t

describe gravity but there’s also something funny in this sector of the Higgs boson because the Higgs boson if you compare it to fundamental math skills that we have some nature is really light and in principle the most natural value for its mass would be orders of more orders of magnitude higher so we don’t understand why it’s really so light that we can produce it here and this price also 2020 build models beyond this model that we have

now to understand how the Higgs boson can keep so light because you know the physics that we imagine that should be out there would would make the exposure much much heavier than no and there are other models be understandable that can explain why it’s alight and we’re searching for this models one of them is called supersymmetry so I’d so perhaps you already heard about it because it’s also quite popular were to have a particle

was already mentioned something some of them in the standard world you would have a super part of it that would help to keep this mass of the six-person so light and so we’re searching for these super partners for example we’re searching for this copy of the Standard Model of these partners of the standard model that could explain why the exposed or behaves as a behave so this is one big past where we have much hopes another process also mmm higgs boson as

we see it now is also fundamental particle but it could also be that its proposed of something more fundamental and this assaults would also solve many many of the questions that we ask ourselves now by really the Higgs particle behavior this behaves so we’re also searching for a substructure in this particle yeah and for example also in supersymmetry the other Syria was mentioning there’s not only one explosive so there could be more so we

also searching for for other process of this exposes really i mean i could continue for hours is really much much we think that should be out there and which should be discovered just we need to find out how we can produce it and this is the important question hmm wow very very intriguing so i mean from what I’m understanding you guys you guys were I mean this is basically at first you were confirming a theory that was developed in 1964 by peter higgs and and

you were able to discover this elementary sort of particle that and confirm it and now you’ve doubled the energy in this device and you’re you’re trying to confirm more so the standard model and develop it further you don’t know what you’ll find we have some ideas what we might find but right now we’re not sure what we will find so on one side we are testing this standard model as you correctly said to more and more precision so we will measure the

properties of the six paths on how it decays to other particles of the standard model will measure other interactions of particles in the standard model to more and more accuracy to be able to see deviations there because this model said I was mentioning before that could replace the stomach model or at some point they would predict small small differences and for example how the Higgs boson decays these are very hard to see if you just produce

few weeks bosons you really need to produce many many of them you need a large statistics there to be able to really dig out this small small differences in the behavior from the large sample so this is the program that is starting now really trying to be more and more precise and really too I mean if we be pessimistic two more and more confirm the standard model or to be optimistic perhaps we see you little deviation in these properties perhaps we

produce a little bit more explosives that we our Syrah predicted all we produce a little bit less and then we can see which series would predict that and how they could solve the problems of the current zero so this is really the precision program that we’re doing here also we have the hope that just as we produce the six buzzards we might produce other new particles like for example another force carrier so for example we might discover a fifth force

and in addition to the normal forces all for the matter particles and this is really what we are really excited now all these new things to come I think it’s very interesting just because i mean i don’t i don’t think the technology to do an experiment like this has ever existed before I mean do you think it’s possible that we could maybe spawn a mini universe by doing this experiment yeah I mean I know I can’t see how this could be done I mean

extreme things these two things can really happen once once we get the Planck scale which I was saying the scale gravity but this is really artists of market to beyond what we can do with with this machine here so we are really more after creating new particles unless unless some series are true that were posed for example by nima like on eharmony famous physicist from the US and gr valleys I was demopolis several years ago where is very very fundamental

skill the Planck scale would not be out of reach so this is also me right now the data doesn’t look like this would be the case because we would probably already see hints in our data to that but one ever knows if we go to higher energies we also might hit surprises so in case the space-time would really look different from from what we expect now we might create very strange things like black holes for so bad as I said this would not be dangerous I must stress

this but we can we can we can see many interesting things perhaps so I mean let’s let’s go into what your life is like in inside of CERN and what you do there on a regular basis I mean how how does how does that happen how does that work yes oh I have my office here so we are together we are two people per office you know the theory floor so I must say as a series I’m trying to interpret the data that the LHC deliverers are trying to make

predictions what we would see at the LHC that will then be compared to what we really see so this is this is my job and people like us we are we are not the majority here it sound so soon as around 3,000 people working here regularly and the co department we have perhaps 60 to 80 or so so we are really a small group and this other speak majority is really running the machine and analyzing data and really doing the very important

work to keep this machine going what I’m doing on the other hand I could also do the same thing at another place I don’t need to be at the same place where this machine is but it’s very nice to be here because if I have my dear I can directly talk to the people that do really the measurements this is really I mean this is right now certainly the most exciting place in the world between what I do for them in particle physics because we have

really the experiment that tries to find your ideas just just under yourself yeah and so what I do I mean I come to the office in the morning I discussed with my colleagues I usually one has several projects at a time or for example what I was working on recently was trying to to find out how well we can measure not the production of one single tech expose on but of Hick’s pairs so producing to expose ons in just one collision so we

produce many many explosions but usually in one collision we produced just one but for example one can if 11 Billy tries hard and wait for a long time when can also find the process of producing expires so I was studying the amount of Hick’s Paris or would produce if the Standard Model of particle physics would not be the correct theory but if we would have a deviation from this model and I was paralyzing these deviations from this model in the most channel way

that one can do it and then trying to understand really how far we can go how many experimental or if it can be less or so when they compared with other compared with other measurements so this is a project I’m just working on and what it means daily I mean I I sit in front of my computer I’m I’m programming also thinking quite a lot just sitting there and and trying to sync on new methods to improve things and also I mean that is hearest also a lot of my

daily time goes in just sitting and thinking because there are many things that are not understood in the the current description of nature that we have and it’s about trying to understand what word might fail and then how it could be improved and then if you have an idea to go to my next door and then talk really I mean I’m really honored to be here because once many worlds greatest experts are here and I’m still rather young in my career as a

fellow so I can talk to the greatest experts in all the fields they have a new idea and ask their opinion and perhaps work with them and make some predictions that might be tested this is experiment where I’m just sitting years old this is more lesson one aspect of my daily life I don’t know if you search the internet for what’s going on at CERN but people people are worried people are a bit scared I mean reasonably so so I mean let’s dispel that beer let’s let’s

sort of remove the veil I mean how how can we understand better what is happening at LHC yeah i mean what one should really have no fear because we are not doing something I mean something really which has never been done before we are I mean as I said these collisions that that were performing here they happen because in the universe we have four particles that will be accelerated and fields in the universe and they will hit each other and we’re just making

this experiment here on earth well we are producing much more more collisions that we can really learn about them so it’s just we are we are trying to understand the processes that happen in the universe all over the universe were trying to understand them better by observing them so this is really what we do at CERN so we are really trying to to have these processes here and our control we can monitor what happens and we really try to understand better what

is happening this can be can be a benefit for all of us I mean one never knows which applications can come out of this so i would really have enough you feel in trying to understand that all our universe it’s just about understanding that we’re not changing anything yet right right so I mean what how do you think you mentioned changing our lives how do you think you could change the way that we live I mean in a practical way yeah right now I cannot tell that

yeah but for example also when electricity was discovered I mean it was first it was not not clear how useful it would be you in the future so it’s always I mean this really this most fundamental research before probably you don’t know what will be the outcome but they can be many outcomes for example also indirect outcomes like like cancer therapy for example now in different places all over the world particle accelerators are also used to treat

cancer and this is like a spin-off of this technique was not invented to do so but it can be used and there are they are more so I think we just should always try to push real boundaries of our understanding without knowing worley but there will always be innovations for example so we communicate now by the world wide web care and you know this was invented its own it was was a spinoff from scientists trying to make their communication more efficient and

there are also also innovations for industry I mean we have really here many parts of the accelerator really require new techniques also from engineering from industry and this can also be used in the future but ok this is spin-offs but ok we never know what we might discover perhaps just referring to the to the example of electricity perhaps we’ll discover something that will change our lives if not we still I think everyone has a force inside I’m really

trying to understand why the universe is as it is how it will finally and or if it will endevour how it emerged these are the questions we are trying to address here for example let me also mention that we can try to measure the properties more exactly and answer these questions I mean what will be the fate of our universe also how was universe created there’s the theory of biogenesis that they are how the symmetry between the matter the

antimatter was created so you know it after that I mean during the Big Bang matter-antimatter were created so the big question is why didn’t it Anna later all together again so matter and antimatter if they meet each other they will animate but it didn’t all annually because we are here happily and also we try to understand these questions because when we measure these properties of all these particles we can also find out why this happened to know why not

all them matter and antimatter only later so it’s really about first of all about trying to understand why things are like they are or they will develop and then they can be unexpected benefits all of us wow this is very intriguing work any any advice for budding physicist or particle physicists that are kind of want to pursue the field that you’re pursuing yeah I my first advice is always be interested always be fascinated about the field I’m not

thinking we understood already most of it always asking questions and yeah and so we have sky’s the limit I mean never never same okay I can never reach this always trying very hard and so yeah I mean first you need to be fascinated about it and then just trying to go for it and speak with people I like that answer flora nazar is there I mean should I just direct people to the CERN website or is there a way to contact you right now I mean when I can be found on

the throne websites on the theory department I I can be found on yeah I mean yeah there are my contact details in the theory division and also one can also for applying for tours at surin one can write to discern contact address and the phone wants to make a tour of the facility here I think I can come justice to everyone’s very fascinating also when the accelerator is running and one cannot go to every point on the crowd there are also models of

the thing and there’s much to see here on the campus florina I really appreciate your time and thank you so much for being here yeah it was the moment to talk to you this is the human experience guys we’re gonna get out of here thank you so much for listening