Spontaneous symmetry breaking, gauge theories, the Higgs mechanism and all that

Jeremy Bernstein
Rev. Mod. Phys. 46, 7 – Published 1 January 1974; Errata Rev. Mod. Phys. 46, 855 (1974); Rev. Mod. Phys. 47, 259 (1975)
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Abstract

A more or less self-contained introductory review is presented of the so-called Higgs phenomenon. This is the mechanism by which, in a certain class of gauge theories, the "photon" and would-be Goldstone scalar mesons conspire together to produce massive vector mesons via a "spontaneous" breaking of gauge invariance. It is conceivable that this is the way in which nature has chosen to unify weak and electromagnetic interactions. It is hoped that a reader of this review will come to understand the meaning of the first three sentences in this abstract and will then be able to proceed to confront a rapidly growing literature in the subject of gauge theories.

    DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/RevModPhys.46.7

    ©1974 American Physical Society

    Errata

    Authors & Affiliations

    Jeremy Bernstein*

    • Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, New Jersey

    • *Work partially supported by NSF grant GP-36777.

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    Issue

    Vol. 46, Iss. 1 — January - March 1974

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