Does the Higgs Boson Enforce the CCosmic Speed Limit

[Alex K]

QCD is Quantum Chromodynamics, the theory how gluons mediate the strong interaction between quarks.

I was just posting it to show that people actually think about such things, the article is not written for general audience and probably pretty incomprehensible to non-experts apart from some of the introduction and conclusion.
I don't think the discovery changed those findingd much. All they had to assume for their hypothetical world is that neither the Higgs field nor an alternative exist.

This brings up something that puzzles me, though it's not related to the op, since we pretty much said all we need to about that, I feel safe following this digression.

I understand that gluons mediate the strong force and W and Z bosons mediate the weak force. But I've read in more than one article that by mediating the electron/neutrino/positron transformations, the W bosons cause nuclear transmutation. How can that be? How can transforming the electrons (weak force) affect the nucleus (strong force)?

Quarks are the only known particles that are affected by all known fundamental forces of nature, strong weak and electromagnetic, and gravity. A down quark can emit a virtual W- boson and turn into an up quark. This changes a neutron into a proton, and that leads to a nucleus with one higher order. The virtual W- boson can then go on into an electron and a neutrino. This process is known as beta decay because the radiated electrons were historically first called beta rays.