Johns Hopkins University's very own theoretical physicist, Professor David E. Kaplan, and director Mark Levinson’s first collaborative documentary Particle Fever (2013) hit the national film circuit this past month. It is first feature length film chronicling the four major experiments of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN and the five-year quest for the discovery of the Higgs Boson. Although Particle Fever had a relatively slow start at the box office, this film is as much of an achievement in aesthetics as it is in documenting one of the biggest scientific events in recent history. Assisted by such film titans as editor Walter Murch and composer Robert Miller, Levinson follows David Kaplan and his academic contemporaries through the ups and downs of the largest particle accelerator ever constructed.
I attended the sold out debut at the Charles Theater last Sunday with the entire graduate physics department. David Kaplan also attended the screening, introducing the film to an audience composed entirely of Hopkins PhD students, and one undergraduate film major. To further my anticipatory anxiety, my only academic exposure to basic physics concepts ended sophomore year and I haven’t looked back since. While particle physics may seem a little intimidating to the average viewer, Kaplan’s scientific explanations in the film provided just the right amount of information to help me understand as well as receiving the approving nods of the more qualified audience members. Beyond that, the passion and excitement beaming from the cast of scientists involved in the LHC appeared to be contagious, as I found myself actually sitting up at the edge of my seat.
Besides recording one of the most important scientific events in my lifetime from the ground floor, Particle Fever piqued my curiosity by functioning as a human-interest piece on the top particle physicists in the world. What is perhaps more impressive, is that a group of people operating on such a high level of a subject I knew very little about were so incredibly relatable. Very early on in the film, Kaplan interviews his mentor Dr. Savas Dimopoulos, who explains his motivation behind his work in theoretical particle physics as something between art and science. He explains the process in which he chooses his next research endeavor as such; to put it simply he looks for questions that are intellectually fascinating but also reflect an artistic creativity that sets him apart from other scientists in his field. The film also follows Kaplan’s peers such as Nima Arkani-Hamed, one of the most famous particle physicists not only of his age group but also on a global scale. Levinson manages to capture the finesse and skill of Nima’s chalkboard equations in a way that resembles Leonardo da Vinci and his sketchbook to a particle physicist. My favorite character within the film however, was first year CERN post-doc student Monica Dunford. The film contained many of her own video logs as well as a variety of interviews at her work and home spanning the entire five year journey of the ATLAS project, the most publicized experiment at the LHC. As an experimental particle physicist, she explained the distinction, or really delightfully trash talked, the theoretical side of her field. Playfully begrudged, she admitted the symbiotic relationship between the dreamers and the doers, with a slight bias towards the experimental side.
In addition to inspiring an academic passion I didn’t anticipate, the film also resonated with me as human being who has admired the night sky and wondered about the vast interworkings of the universe. The crux of the film, finding the Higgs Boson, now had a much greater significance than when I originally read about it in the fall of 2012. It wasn’t just another particle discovery; the existence of the Higgs had the entire field of physics hinging on it. Everything we knew up to this point about our world and the infinite space surrounding it was supported by two basic particle theories, “Super Symmetry” and “Macroverse”. Both required the Higgs discovery to be possible, but also, data from the experiment could potentially confirm which theory was correct. The mass of the Higgs Boson particle was the deciding factor. It was projected to be around one of two masses: a lighter ~115 GeV and a heavy ~140 GeV corresponding to “Super Symmetry” and “Macroverse” theory respectively. While this is treading into esoteric territory, the simplified version is that “Super Symmetry” supported the existence of more particles that created a stable and balanced universe. “Macroverse” on the other hand, negated the possibility for the discovery of new particles and perhaps the notion that our universe is unstable and unfortunately temporary. Not only was this a dramatic climax in any ficitional sense, the fact that this was a reality was both exciting and terrifying. To summarize, space is as fascinating as it is potentially lethal and particle physics is 'much' cooler than it sounds.
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