Belgian Nobel Laureate François Englert Dies at 93

François Englert, the Belgian theoretical physicist who won the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physics for his pioneering work on the Higgs boson, died on June 18, 2026, in Uccle, Belgium, at the age of 93. His family announced his death to the Belgian French-language public broadcaster RTBF on June 19.

Englert was the first physicist to theoretically demonstrate the existence of the Higgs boson—often called the “God particle”—in 1964. This breakthrough reshaped modern physics and was experimentally confirmed nearly 50 years later at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, on July 4, 2012.

The Discovery That Reshaped Physics

In 1964, Englert and his colleague Robert Brout published the theoretical framework predicting a fundamental particle that gives mass to other particles. Peter Higgs independently reached the same conclusion just 14 days later. The particle was eventually named the Higgs boson, though Englert’s contribution came first.

According to Het Laatste Nieuws, language may have been a factor in the naming—more scientists read English than French. Englert himself was philosophical about it. “Oh, none of that is so important,” he said in an interview 13 years ago.

The Brout-Englert-Higgs mechanism is a cornerstone of the Standard Model of particle physics. Without it, particles would have no mass, and the universe as we know it—with atoms, stars, and planets—could not exist. The experimental confirmation of the Higgs boson in 2012 was one of the greatest scientific achievements of the 21st century, validating nearly 50 years of theoretical work.

A Life of Resilience and Achievement

Englert was born on November 6, 1932, in Etterbeek, Brussels, to a Jewish family of Polish origin. As a child during World War II, he was forced to wear the Star of David and went into hiding with his younger brother, sheltered by multiple families who risked their lives to protect him. He was baptized under a false name to escape the Gestapo. His entire immediate family survived the Holocaust, but his Polish relatives did not.

As VRT NWS reported, Englert later expressed guilt for not having done enough to honor those who saved him. “I felt guilty for not having undertaken enough steps to honor the people who saved me,” he told Paris-Match in 2017.

He earned a degree in civil engineering (1955) and a licentiate in physics (1957) from the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). He then spent two years at Cornell University in the United States, working under Robert Brout, before returning to ULB as a lecturer in 1961 and professor in 1964. In 1980, he co-founded ULB’s Department of Theoretical Physics with Brout.

Honors and Legacy

Englert remains the only Belgian ever to win the Nobel Prize in Physics. His honors include the Francqui Prize (1982), the Wolf Prize in Physics (2004, jointly with Brout and Higgs), and the title of Baron, granted by the Belgian king in 2014. The lower sphere of the Atomium—one of Brussels’ most iconic landmarks—was renamed the “François Englert Sphere” in his honor.

Annemie Schaus, Rector of ULB, paid tribute to his legacy. “He leaves behind more than just an exceptional scientific oeuvre. He leaves a profoundly remarkable human and intellectual legacy,” she said. “The emeritus professor of ULB devoted his life to unraveling the most fundamental mysteries of the universe. He did so with extreme precision, curiosity, and elegance that inspired generations of physicists.”

An Era Comes to a Close

With Englert’s passing and the death of Peter Higgs in April 2024, an era in physics has come to a close. The two men, who independently unlocked one of the universe’s deepest secrets, are now both gone. But the Brout-Englert-Higgs mechanism remains a permanent pillar of our understanding of the cosmos—a testament to the power of human curiosity and the resilience of a man who survived the darkest chapter of the 20th century to illuminate the fundamental nature of reality.

Englert is survived by his wife and five children.