The Z boson

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BIRTH OF WEB, LHC...</span> <div class="search-block-form block block-search block-search-form-block" data-drupal-selector="search-block-form" role="search"> <form action="/search/node" method="get" id="search-block-form" accept-charset="UTF-8"> <div class="form-item js-form-item form-type-search js-form-type-search form-item-keys js-form-item-keys form-no-label form-group"> <label for="edit-keys" class="control-label sr-only">Search</label> <div class="input-group"><input title="Enter the terms you wish to search for." data-drupal-selector="edit-keys" class="form-search form-control" placeholder="Search" type="search" id="edit-keys" name="keys" value="" size="15" maxlength="128" data-toggle="tooltip" /><span class="input-group-btn"><button type="submit" value="Search" class="button js-form-submit form-submit btn-primary btn icon-only"><span class="sr-only">Search</span><span class="icon glyphicon glyphicon-search" aria-hidden="true"></span></button></span></div> </div> <div class="form-actions form-group js-form-wrapper form-wrapper" data-drupal-selector="edit-actions" id="edit-actions"></div> </form> </div> </div> </div> </li> <li class="dropdown cern-menu-lang-switcher"> <a class="dropdown-toggle" data-toggle="dropdown" aria-expanded="true"> <span class="separator">|</span> en <span class="caret"></span> </a> <ul class="dropdown-menu"> <li><section class="language-switcher-language-url block block-language block-language-blocklanguage-interface clearfix" role="navigation"> <ul class="links"><li hreflang="en" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/509" class="en is-active"><a href="/science/physics/z-boson" class="language-link is-active" hreflang="en" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/509">en</a></li><li hreflang="fr" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/509" class="fr"><a href="/fr/science/physics/z-boson" class="language-link" hreflang="fr" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/509">fr</a></li></ul> </section> </li> </ul> </li> </ul> </div>  </div>  </nav> </nav> </div> </section> </div> </div> </div> </div> </header> <main role="main"> <a id="main-content" tabindex="-1"></a> <div class="container-fluid cern-page-display-page cern-page-display-story_page"> <div class="has-no-column wrapper-center col-md-12 col-sm-12 col-xs-12"> <div class="region region-content"> <div data-drupal-messages-fallback class="hidden"></div> <div data-drupal-messages-fallback class="hidden"></div> <div class="layout layout__region story-page-node-layout-content"> <div class="field--items"> <div class="field--item"> <div class="component-row component-row__display__fluidcenter section-navigation component-row__has-header effect_none is_half_height"> <div class="background__veil"></div> <div class="background-component background__cds_media" style="height: 100%;"> <figure class="cds-image" data-record-id="615824" data-filename="" id="CERN-EX-8704168-1"> <a href="//cds.cern.ch/images/CERN-EX-8704168-1" title="View on CDS"> <img alt="UA1: first Z event recorded" src="//cds.cern.ch/images/CERN-EX-8704168-1/file?size=large"/> </a> <figcaption> This image taken by the UA1 experiment on 30 April 1983 was the first detection of a Z0 particle. <span> (Image: CERN)</span> </figcaption> </figure> </div> <div class="component-row__row"> <div class="component-row__column component-row__center section-has-no-column col-md-12 col-sm-12 col-xs-12"> <div class="box-effects-wrapper "> <div class="cern-component-header-blocks component-header"> <div id="header-blocks--2" class="owl-carousel owl-theme component-header__carousel header-carousel"> <div class="header-block"> <div class="header-block__title"> <h3 class="header-block__name" > <span>The Z boson </span> <span class="header-block__name__underline"></span> </h3> <span class="header-block__subhead" ><hr> <p class="text-align-center">The Z boson is a neutral elementary particle that - along with its electrically charged cousin, the W boson - carries the weak force</p> </span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <a class="endof-cern-header-blocks"></a> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="field--item"> <div class="component-row component-row__display__centered section-navigation effect_none"> <div class="component-row__row"> <div class="component-row__column component-row__center section-has-no-column col-md-12 col-sm-12 col-xs-12"> <div class="box-effects-wrapper "> <div class="component-margin component-margin-small" ></div> <div class="text-component text-component-page clearfix"> <div class="text-component-text cern_full_html"> <p>Discovered in 1983 by physicists at the <a href="/science/accelerators/super-proton-synchrotron">Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS)</a> at CERN, the Z boson is a neutral elementary particle. Like its electrically charged cousin, the <a href="/science/physics/w-boson-sunshine-and-stardust">W boson</a>, the Z boson carries the weak force.</p> <p>The weak force is essentially as strong as the electromagnetic force, but it appears weak because its influence is limited by the large mass of the W and Z bosons. Their mass limits the range of the weak force to about 10<sup>-18</sup> metres, and it vanishes altogether beyond the radius of a single proton.</p> <p>Enrico Fermi was the first to put forth a theory of the weak force in 1933, but it was not until the 1960s that Sheldon Glashow, Abdus Salam and Steven Weinberg developed the theory in its present form, when they proposed that the weak and electromagnetic forces are actually different manifestations of one electroweak force. </p> <p>By emitting an electrically charged W boson, the weak force can cause a particle such as the proton to change its charge by changing the flavour of its quarks. In 1958, Sidney Bludman suggested that there might be another arm of the weak force, the so-called "weak neutral current," mediated by an uncharged partner of the W bosons, which later became known as the Z boson.</p> <p>Physicists working with the <a href="/science/experiments/gargamelle">Gargamelle bubble chamber</a> experiment at CERN presented the first convincing evidence to support this idea in 1973. Neutrinos are particles that interact only via the weak interaction, and when the physicists examined collisions they were able to detect evidence of the weak neutral current, and hence indirect evidence for the Z boson.</p> <p>At the end of the 1970s, physicists <a href="/about/who-we-are/our-people/biographies/carlo-rubbia">Carlo Rubbia</a>, Peter McIntyre and David Cline suggested converting what was then CERN’s biggest accelerator, the Super Proton Synchrotron, to operate as a proton-antiproton collider, with the aim of producing W and Z bosons directly. Both types of particle were observed there for the first time in 1983 by the <a href="/science/experiments/ua1">UA1</a> and <a href="/science/experiments/ua2">UA2</a> experiments.</p> <p>The bosons were then studied in more detail at CERN and at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in the US. In 1989, <a href="https://cds.cern.ch/record/858610/files/CM-P00054839.pdf">first physics results</a> from the <a href="/science/accelerators/large-electron-positron-collider">Large Electron-Positron collider</a> at CERN measured the width of the Z boson and confirmed that there are only three neutrino types in Nature: electron, muon and tau. During the 1990s, LEP and the SLAC Linear Collider in the US produced millions of Z bosons for further study. These results culminated in the need to search for the final piece of the <a href="/science/physics/standard-model">Standard Model</a> – the <a href="/science/physics/higgs-boson">Higgs boson</a>, which was <a href="/news/press-release/cern/cern-experiments-observe-particle-consistent-long-sought-higgs-boson">discovered</a> in July 2012.</p> <p>The discovery of W and Z bosons was an extraordinary technical triumph, confirming a critical aspect of the Standard Model. As a result, the <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1984/summary/">1984 Nobel prize in physics</a> was awarded to Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer.</p> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> </main> <footer role="contentinfo"> <div class="row cern-footer"> <div class="col-xs-12 col-sm-4 col-md-4 col-lg-4 footer-first-col"> <div class="region region-footercolumn1"> <section id="block-followus" class="block block-block-content block-block-content6d2579e3-b650-496f-b854-0c744e176f43 clearfix"> <div class="block-custom-wrapper block-content block-content--type-basic block-content--view-mode-full ds-1col clearfix"> <div class="field field--name-field-visible-title field--type-string field--label-hidden field--item"> <p>Follow Us</p> </div> <div class="field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field--item"><p style="font-size:36px; font-family: CERNIcons, CernIcons, cern-icons; display: flex; gap: 10px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/cern"><img alt="Facebook icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="5da97013-d976-42e3-aaf3-c2cdf2683c3d" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/Facebook.png" width="40" loading="lazy"> </a> <a href="http://www.instagram.com/cern"> <img alt="Instagram icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="e80bf359-c309-4a5e-ae36-a6d4b950b285" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/Instagram.png" width="40" loading="lazy"> </a> <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@cern_ontiktok"> <img alt="TikTok icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="8fc6b5aa-066e-4eb5-88de-56b61690e174" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/TikTok_0.png" width="40" loading="lazy"></a> <a href="https://x.com/CERN"> <img alt="X icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="f1391fcf-1b27-42d5-9712-2052e2fceee5" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/X.png" width="40" loading="lazy"> </a> <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/company/cern"> <img alt="LinkedIn icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="8674b1e8-b762-48f5-a649-f251a0eb6ad7" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/LinkedIn.png" width="40" loading="lazy"> </a> <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/cerntv"> <img alt="Youtube icon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="d429f87c-f790-4309-b0be-970374a526f9" height="40" src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/lburdych/Youtube.png" width="40" loading="lazy"></a></p> <p> </p> <p><a href="https://linktr.ee/CERN_official" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">More Social Media Accounts</a></p> </div> </div> </section> </div> </div> <div class="col-xs-12 col-sm-8 col-md-8 col-lg-8 footer-second-col"> <div class="row">  <div class="col-sm-5 col-md-4 col-md-offset-0 col-lg-4 col-lg-offset-0"> <div class="region region-footercolumn2"> <nav role="navigation" aria-labelledby="block-findusmenu-menu" id="block-findusmenu"> <h2 id="block-findusmenu-menu">Find us</h2> <ul class="menu menu--find-us-menu nav"> <li class="first"> <a href="/contact" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/150">Contact us</a> </li> <li class="last"> <a href="/directions" data-drupal-link-system-path="node/153">Getting here</a> </li> </ul> </nav> <section id="block-contactus" class="block block-block-content block-block-content17426485-662a-41e2-b3c6-3e42f882ec6f clearfix"> <div class="block-custom-wrapper block-content block-content--type-basic block-content--view-mode-full ds-1col clearfix"> <div class="field field--name-body field--type-text-with-summary field--label-hidden field--item"><p> </p> <ul> <li>CERN</li> <li>Esplanade des Particules 1</li> <li>P.O. 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