Higgs boson data may point to supersymmetry

Since the announcement of the discovery of the Higgs boson particle at CERN in Geneva, many physicists have been trying see how it fits in the Universe and whether its existence supports a particular theory of physics: the prevalent standard model (SM) or supersymmetry (SUSY), which proposes that matter and forces — fermions and bosons — are flip sides of the same coin.

Researchers from Zewail City of Science and Technology in Cairo and the University of Southampton in the UK have demonstrated that the data gathered in the search for the Higgs boson deviates up to 25% from predictions made using the standard model. This means, the authors suggest, that the data conforms to predictions made using supersymmetry. The research is published in Physical Review D.

Using data from CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the team investigated the effects of minute light particles from supersymmetry on the Higgs field. These particles, named charginos, can enhance the Higgs boson event rates at the LHC when the particle decays into two photons, supporting the idea of supersymmetry. They also found that light charged Higgs particles, as opposed to the neutral one already discovered, can act in a similar way. This potentially means that the discovery of Higgs particle is only the first of many such findings to come from CERN.

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