But occasionally a neutrino reacts with an atom to create a particle called a muon.

ECONOMIST: Neutrino astronomy

The theory is that when a muon encounters a gas molecule, it can knock off an electron, leaving a positively charged ion in its wake.

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If and when a neutrino does bump into something, the interaction spits out one of three particles an electron, a muon or a tau (the last two are heavy, unstable objects with most of the characteristics of an electron).

ECONOMIST: Neutrinos

This distance-related decline is strong evidence of a gradual shift from muon-to tau-flavoured neutrinos.

ECONOMIST: Neutrinos

The reason is that another experimental result, published in 1995 by the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, showed signs of a third sort of oscillation, from muon-to electron-flavoured neutrinos.

ECONOMIST: Neutrinos

"The preliminary results with the full 2012 data set are magnificent and to me it is clear that we are dealing with a Higgs boson though we still have a long way to go to know what kind of Higgs boson it is, " Joe Incandela, spokesperson for the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment, said in a statement.

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