Don't wait for the LHC - get your Higgs boson now

Yesterday the large hadron collider started up successfully, and the world did not end. But it will still be months before we have exciting collision data, so don't hold your breath waiting for that Higgs boson - unless you want to buy a stuffed one at Particle Zoo:

i-a0fad3868db70c8dbb84bc665d111d9b-higgs_plushie.jpg

Wait - a Higgs boson costs just $9.75?! Someone should have told CERN before they spent all those billions of Euros!

If the Higgs boson is too trendy for you, Julie at Particle Zoo also offers a Z boson, which looks kinda like a Pac-Man ghost, or one of the three neutrinos, which resemble the disembodied heads of Ninja turtles, or the graviton, which looks like. . . never mind.

Anyway, these are the perfect physical science counterparts to the previous plush geek gifts of choice, germs.

Via Jen at Twisted Physics.

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How much does it weigh?

By HoverCraftWheel (not verified) on 11 Sep 2008 #permalink

If they told you that, there'd be nothing left for the LHC to do. We don't want a sad collider on our hands, do we?

i'll plug for Giant Microbes, but they're a LOT better looking than those poor particles (i work with food recalls a lot, and now i can display the appropriate culprit -- E. coli, salmonella, BSE, etc.)

although i do like how the particles have different fillings to approximate relative mass

Do my bosons give you a hadron? -- bad particle physics joke

How much does it weigh?

I think they weigh using a special set of scales called Planck scales and they also charge for negative weight and mass.