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Peter Higgs

1929 - 2024

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Peter Ware Higgs (29 May 1929 – 8 April 2024) was an English theoretical physicist, professor at the University of Edinburgh, and Nobel laureate in Physics for his work on the mass of subatomic particles. In 1964, Higgs was the single author of one of the three milestone papers published in Physical Review Letters (PRL) that proposed that spontaneous symmetry breaking in electroweak theory could explain the origin of mass of elementary particles in general and of the W and Z bosons in particular. This Higgs mechanism predicted the existence of a new particle, the Higgs boson, the detection of which became one of the great goals of physics. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Peter Higgs has received more than 1,731,939 page views. His biography is available in 78 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 73 in 2019). Peter Higgs is the 93rd most popular physicist (down from 89th in 2019), the 246th most popular biography from United Kingdom (up from 277th in 2019) and the 16th most popular British Physicist.

Peter Higgs is most famous for his theory of the Higgs Boson, which is a subatomic particle that gives mass to other particles.

Memorability Metrics

  • 1.7M

    Page Views (PV)

  • 69.09

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 78

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 9.83

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 4.21

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Among PHYSICISTS

Among physicists, Peter Higgs ranks 93 out of 851. Before him are Jean Baptiste Perrin, Clinton Davisson, Carl Zeiss, Wilhelm Eduard Weber, Ernst Ruska, and Leo Szilard. After him are Emil Lenz, Gustaf Dalén, Aage Bohr, William Rowan Hamilton, George Gamow, and Owen Willans Richardson.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1929, Peter Higgs ranks 21. Before him are Jacques Brel, Yayoi Kusama, Michael Ende, Jean Baudrillard, Frank Gehry, and Oriana Fallaci. After him are Mohamed Al-Fayed, Max von Sydow, Sándor Kocsis, Christopher Plummer, Djalma Santos, and Tigran Petrosian. Among people deceased in 2024, Peter Higgs ranks 4. Before him are Franz Beckenbauer, Mário Zagallo, and Daniel Kahneman. After him are Paul Auster, Alice Munro, Vittorio Emanuele, Prince of Naples, O. J. Simpson, Arno Allan Penzias, Françoise Hardy, Sebastián Piñera, and Alexei Navalny.

Others Born in 1929

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Others Deceased in 2024

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In United Kingdom

Among people born in United Kingdom, Peter Higgs ranks 246 out of 8,785. Before him are Jeremy Irons (1948), Ken Miles (1918), Ken Follett (1949), Jimmy Page (1944), Phil Collins (1951), and Francis Galton (1822). After him are Roger Taylor (1949), James II of England (1633), Alan Parker (1944), Brian Jones (1942), David Lloyd George (1863), and Ian Fleming (1908).

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Among PHYSICISTS In United Kingdom

Among physicists born in United Kingdom, Peter Higgs ranks 16. Before him are William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin (1824), Thomas Young (1773), James Chadwick (1891), C. F. Powell (1903), Charles Glover Barkla (1877), and Charles Thomson Rees Wilson (1869). After him are Owen Willans Richardson (1879), Edward Victor Appleton (1892), John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh (1842), Roger Penrose (1931), William Henry Bragg (1862), and Henry Moseley (1887).

British born Physicists

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