The Best Particle Physics Books of All Time

Journey into an unseen world―and to the frontiers of human knowledge. Welcome to Atom Land, the impossibly small world of quantum physics. With award–winning physicist Jon Butterworth as your guide, you’ll set sail from Port Electron in search of strange new terrain. Each discovery will expand the horizons of your trusty map―from the Hadron Island to the Isle of Quarks and beyond. Just beware of Dark Energy and other sea monsters! A masterful work of metaphor, Atom Land also gives form to the forces that shape the universe: Electromagnetism is a highway system; the strong force, a railway; the weak force, an airline.

But, like Butterworth, you may find that curiosity is the strongest force of all―one that pulls you across the subatomic seas, toward the unknown realm of Antimatter, and to the very outer reaches of the cosmos. B&W illustrations throughout.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of modern particle physics accessible to anyone with a true passion for wanting to know how the universe works. We are introduced to the known particles of the world we live in. An elegant explanation of quantum mechanics and relativity paves the way for an understanding of the laws that govern particle physics. These laws are put into action in the world of accelerators, colliders and detectors found at institutions such as CERN and Fermilab that are in the forefront of technical innovation.

Real world and theory meet using Feynman diagrams to solve the problems of infinities and deduce the need for the Higgs boson. Facts and Mysteries in Elementary Particle Physics offers an incredible insight from an eyewitness and participant in some of the greatest discoveries in 20th century science. From Einstein's theory of relativity to the spectacular discovery of the Higgs particle, this book will fascinate and educate anyone interested in the world of quarks, leptons and gauge theories. This book also contains many thumbnail sketches of particle physics personalities, including contemporaries as seen through the eyes of the author. Illustrated with pictures, these candid sketches present rare, perceptive views of the characters that populate the field. The Chapter on Particle Theory, in a pre-publication, was termed "superbly lucid" by David Miller in Nature (Vol. 396, 17 Dec. 1998, p. 642). Readership: Students, lay people and anyone interested in the world of elementary particles.

A brilliantly diverting and mind-expanding guide to quantum and particle physics. At the start of the twentieth century, our knowledge of science appeared complete and it seemed that the laws of nature were almost all discovered, but then we woke a sleeping giant—we discovered quantum mechanics. In the quantum realm, objects can be in two places at once. It’s a place where time travel is not only possible, but necessary. It’s a place where cause and effect can happen in reverse and observing something changes its state.

From parallel universes to antimatter, quantum mechanics has revealed that when you get right down to it, the laws of nature are insane. The scientist J. B. S. Haldane once said, “Reality is not only stranger than we imagine, it’s stranger than we can imagine.”. Never is this more true than with quantum mechanics. This comprehensive beginner’s guide to quantum mechanics explains not only the weirdness of the subject but the experiments that proved it to be true. Using a humorous and light-hearted approach, Fundamental tells the story of how the most brilliant minds in science grappled with seemingly impossible ideas and gave us everything from microchips to particle accelerators. Fundamental gives clear explanations of all the quantum phenomena known to modern science, without requiring an understanding of complex mathematics; it tells the eccentric stories of the scientists who made these shattering discoveries and what they used them for; it explains how quantum field theory (a topic not covered in detail by any other popular-science book) gave rise to particle physics and why the Higgs boson isn’t the end of the story.