I am excited by all this discussion of the Higgs Bosun particle/field in "real life". This has obvious implications for Treknology, offering an explanation of how some of it might work. Since the bosuns are the means by which other particles acquire "mass", manipulating the bosuns in the field could either increase or decrease the mass of objects within the field. Run a modified Higgs bosun field through deck plating and it's apparent mass increases which in turn increases it's apparent gravity (since gravity comes from mass ultimately). A computer calculated Higgs field applied to a ship and it's contents along opposing vectors to extant motion would cancel out inertial effects. And lastly, the subspace driver coils said to be built into impulse engines (esp 24th century ones), hyper-accelerate the exhaust plasma, producing multiple times the amount of thrust per unit of mass expended that it should. Passing the exhaust plasma through a densified Higgs bosun field would be a good theoretical explanation for this effect. Very cool to be able to tie real science into Treknology, isn't it?
Gravity plating is alleged to be done via controlled use of gravitons. I do not recall how the IDF works.
Which does not mean that manipulation of Higgs bosuns cannot be part of the process. Since they impart mass, which carries with it gravity/gravitons, it is still a viable explanation of the mechanism by which artificial gravity works. A simple, off the top of my head possibility would be that intensifying or supersaturating the Higgs bosun field of the deck plating would allow more "mass" to attach to each particle of the plating, allowing each plate particle to carry more gravity that it naturally would.
I don't think the discovery of the Higgs Boson changes anything. I don't think it's something we can manipulate effectively or efficiently.
Bosun: a petty officer on a merchant ship Boson: any of a group of elementary particles, such as a photon or pion, that has zero or integral spin and obeys the rules of Bose-Einstein statistics
Wouldn't manipulating the Higgs Field to give the deck plates apparent mass to simulate gravity be effectively the same thing as giving them actual mass and actual gravity. In other words, if the artificial gravity system worked like that, it would be a really bad day on any planet that a starship is orbiting.
We don't know one way or the other...you could limit the manipulation of the boson field to just the parts whose mass you want to increase (in theory), which would leave nearby planets/other ships/etc unaffected. At any rate, playing around with gravity fields is beyond us (for now and for the foreseeable future), so we have no idea how it is done. Maniuplating Higgs bosons makes as much sense as magically manipulating gravitons (which are not yet even proven).
Here are some papers that might help you out The Gravitational field of a Cube--perfect for the Borg! http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.3857 Here's your Heisenberg compensator: http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.5485 Open timelike curves, gravity and wormholes http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.0505 http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.0047 Remember the DC comics tracing phasers? About that: Lightning guns http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=15308 For all the Star Fleet Battles folk--self-armoring seltorian asteroid ships http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.5564 # body asteroid system http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.5755 Very fast pulsar http://arxiv.org/abs/1206.5149 I wonder if orbiting reflectors may allow a constant beam... Hypospray-thruster http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.1844 Space weather simulator http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.1866 Future drives New fusion drive proposed http://uah.edu/news/items/10-research/2501-slapshot-to-deep-space http://www.universetoday.com/95991/new-flying-tea-kettle-could-get-us-to-mars-in-weeks-not-months/ http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php/135865-New-%E2%80%9CFlying-Tea-Kettle%E2%80%9D-Could-Get-Us-To-Mars-in-Weeks-Not-Months https://plus.google.com/u/0/105704136900260060076/posts http://www.csnr.usra.edu/ More on the Z-pinch http://nextbigfuture.com/2012/07/washington-plasma-startup-creates-euv.html#more Plasma http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=27082.0 Spiral waves http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/...aves-could-boost-wireless-capacity-infinitely http://www.grepscience.com/archives/tag/fastest-wireless-network-ever-created Paint on batteries http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=15335 Universe in a nutshell http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.1720
Thank you: Here are some other technologies: Moon missions http://trajectory.grc.nasa.gov/aboutus/papers/AIAA-96-2810.pdf Hypercomputation http://arxiv.org/abs/1204.1773 Misc: http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php/130669-First-message-transmitted-with-neutrinos Deadsat lives http://www.gizmodo.com/5925522/us-military-wants-space-zombies-to-feed-on-dead-satellites?tag=space Aerobrake http://braun.gatech.edu/publications/ Aerographite http://www.gizmodo.com/5925944/this-is-aerographite-the-lightest-material-ever-created?tag=science http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php/136612-Graphene-membrane-permeable-to-water-vapor Flame put out with sound http://www.gizmodo.com/science/ Long Now CD-ROM http://www.gizmodo.com/5925719/a-sa...million-years-but-you-cant-afford-it?tag=guts Superwide display http://www.gizmodo.com/5926043/175+degree-display-fills-your-entire-vision-with-gaming-goodness Super-chip http://www.gizmodo.com/5924565/beho...light-and-vibration-at-the-same-time?tag=guts Electric roads http://www.conductix.com/en/news/2012-05-31/10-years-electric-buses-iptr-charge Bioships http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php/113751-Biotechnology-arguments-%28need-help-with-some-facts%29 Oxygen when not breathing: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/art...ple-alive-breathe-injecting-oxygen-blood.html I have heard of liqui-vent, perflurocarbons, surfactants that act like artificial blood and carry oxygen. I think the CRAY computers used it. In an old episode of Beyond 2000, you saw electronics immersed in thistype liquid without shorting out: http://mil-embedded.com/articles/next-generation-fluids-cooling-military-electronics/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_breathing From http://www.starshipmodeler.net/talk/viewtopic.php?p=1414044#1414044
Now here is something to consider for folks who like retro tech computers but want a modern explanation. The TOS bridge consoles had a lot of knobs and switches jutting through a slick black surface, right? Maybe this is that surface: http://www.myboogieboard.com/news/ The answer is that they were always using touch screens--its just that the visible buttons were re-writable function keys for haptics and as back ups.
Here is a big find--space time crystals possible http://www.universetoday.com/96379/a-space-time-crystal-to-outlive-the-universe/
Here it is possible to mine black holes for Hawking radiation Mining black holes http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.3342 http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php/123740-Fun-Papers-In-Arxiv?p=2046339#post2046339 Diamond Oceans Tholian homeworld? www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-01/diamond-oceans-may-cover-neptune-and-uranus
Some more news Zero point chips http://www.technologyreview.com/view/428648/engineers-unveil-first-casimir-chip-that-exploits/ Space-time http://www.universetoday.com/96526/a-crinkle-in-the-wrinkle-of-space-time/ Photon torpedo wrappers? http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.7030 http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.6780 Floating sensors http://arxiv.org/abs/1207.5320 Dynamic dark matter and more http://arxiv.org/abs/1208.0336 http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php/123740-Fun-Papers-In-Arxiv?p=2049817#post2049817 Moon view http://target.lroc.asu.edu/da/qmap.html