Pretty much everyone in physics knew that this year’s Nobel Prize would go to someone connected to the discovery of the Higgs boson (the so-called god particle). This morning, Peter Higgs and Francois Englert were awarded the prize “for the theoretical discovery of a mechanism that contributes to our understanding of the origin of mass of subatomic particles, and which recently was confirmed through the discovery of the predicted fundamental particle, by the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider.”

+ The NYT has a cool and simple interactive guide that attempts to answer the question: What is the Higgs? I could have used one of these guides when I was putting together a desk for my son last night…

+ “Sometimes, those numbers and equations have an uncanny, almost eerie ability to illuminate otherwise dark corners of reality. When they do, we get that much closer to grasping our place in the cosmos.” Brian Greene always does an excellent job of explaining complex science to normal people. Here he fills us in on how the Higgs Boson was found.

+ Here’s a look back at some video that shows the moment Peter Higgs learned that his particle had been found.

+ Researchers at the National Ignition Facility in Livermore just took a step towards their own Nobel Prize (and a world of unlimited and cheap energy). “The amount of energy released through the fusion reaction exceeded the amount of energy being absorbed by the fuel – the first time this had been achieved at any fusion facility in the world.” This is really is incredible stuff that is worth knowing about.

+ OK, it’s not fusion, but Nest has introduced its next product. And it’s a smoke detector that won’t wake you up in the middle of the night (unless there’s a fire).