There's a whole zoo of subatomic particles.

It extends from the subatomic scale to the farthest reaches of the cosmos.

Solar flares are enormous magnetic outbursts from the Sun that bombard the Earth with high speed subatomic particles.

This energy is immediately converted into a spray of subatomic particles, with detectors and computers used to figure out their properties.

If we're blind to this simple biology, imagine what we're missing at the smallest subatomic level right now and at the grandest cosmic levels.

The world turns on symmetry from the spin of subatomic particles to the dizzying beauty of an arabesque. But there's more to it than meets the eye. Here, Oxford mathematician Marcus du Sautoy offers a glimpse of the invisible numbers that marry all symmetrical objects.

According to the Standard Model, Higgs particles scatter off each other, so they, too, should have mass. The latest research indicates that Higgs particles (if they exist) should be among the most massive critters of the subatomic realm, more than 120 times as massive as the familiar proton.

Einstein's theory not only describes our universe, from the Big Bang to black holes it has also taught physicists the relevance of geometry and symmetry lessons that spread from particle physics to crystallography. But, despite the similarities that Einstein's theory has with other theories in physics, it stands apart by its refusal to fit together with quantum mechanics, the theory that explains the dominant behavior of matter at the atomic and subatomic scale.