Data from Fermilab’s Tevatron particle collider, released today, add more evidence for the existence of the Higgs boson, one of the most sought-after prizes in modern physics. The so-called “God particle” may create the mass found in every other particle in the universe. There was a lot of excitement last December when Europe’s Large Hadron Collider found hints that the particle resided at energies between 115 and 127 gigaelectronvolts. Scientists at Fermilab, poring over older Tevatron data—the collider was actually mothballed last fall in favor of newer instruments—found activity between 115 and 135 gigaelectronvolts. That overlap confirms the European work and narrows the range for Higgs hunters, who think they will bag their quarry sometime this year.




