The branch of physics studying the behavior of matter and energy at extreme scales, like particle accelerators.High-energy physics is the branch of physics that studies the fundamental constituents of matter and the forces acting between them at the smallest scales and highest energies. It seeks to answer questions about the basic building blocks of the universe, such as quarks, leptons, and bosons, and how they interact. The field is also known as particle physics, and it explores phenomena that occur under extreme conditions, often recreating states similar to those just after the Big Bang.
The field emerged in the mid-20th century with the development of particle accelerators and the discovery of a growing 'zoo' of hadrons. The Standard Model of particle physics, developed in the 1970s, became the cornerstone theory, later confirmed by the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012.
High-energy physicists use particle accelerators to collide particles at velocities close to the speed of light. These collisions convert kinetic energy into mass, creating new, often short-lived particles. Detectors surrounding the collision points record the trajectories, energies, and identities of the debris, allowing physicists to infer the properties of the particles that were produced and to test theoretical predictions.
Techniques and technologies developed for high-energy physics, such as particle detectors and accelerator technology, are used in medical imaging (e.g., PET scans) and cancer therapy (hadron therapy).
The Large Hadron Collider at CERN, the world's most powerful particle accelerator, operates at energies that existed just a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang.
