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What's the difference between Dark Energy and the Higgs field?

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Higgs: According to the Standard Model of Particle Physics, the Higgs field has a "constant" value throughout all of space of 246 GeV. However the potential energy of the Higgs potential energy function is exactly zero at this particular value (at least according to the Standard Model). read more

So this Higgs field value should not be contributing to the dark energy which is driving the accelerated expansion of the universe. A simple way of seeing that a field value is not the same as a potential energy value would be to look at the electric field and the potential energy function of a charged particle in that field. read more

From the point of view of cosmology, the vacuum appears to have an energy density, which is sometimes called “dark energy” or the “cosmological constant”, responsible for the observed accelerated expansion of the universe. From a particle physics viewpoint, the vacuum is permeated by a “Higgs Field” - named after physicist Peter Higgs. read more

And indeed, by studying the Higgs boson and Higgs field, physicists could gain some important insights into the universe’s beginning‚ a time when a brief burst of inflationary expansion planted the seeds for the galaxies, and by consequence, dark energy itself. read more

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