Google+ trends: Higgs boson particle discovered, Tom Cruise's 50th birthday

Google+’ers have been following the live announcement on the web and are excitedly discussing the ramifications of the huge discovery.

“It's official: the Higgs boson, aka the God particle, has been found (at 99.999%)! This is a great discovery for the entire science world,” post Google+’ers. “Congrats to CERN and physicists everywhere. Amazing announcement.”

“The discovery of Higgs boson (or similar) is huge for science, nature and the world. It could prove everything and allow us to understand everything better, while potentially advancing us as a race,” add others while snidely making comments about the use of the Comic Sans font in CERN’s presentation slides.

“It’s hard not to get excited by these results,” said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci in a statement. “We stated last year that in 2012 we would either find a new Higgs-like particle or exclude the existence of the Standard Model Higgs. With all the necessary caution, it looks to me that we are at a branching point: the observation of this new particle indicates the path for the future towards a more detailed understanding of what we’re seeing in the data.”

American actor Tom Cruise has celebrated his 50th birthday amidst a storm of publicity over his marriage breakdown with Katie Holmes.

Google+ users are wishing the star a happy birthday for July 3, but can’t help discussing the pair’s breakup.

“Happy 50th birthday to one of the all-time great actors, Tom Cruise! Tom has had a rough week to say the least but deserves nothing but the best on the day of his 5-0,” say Plussers. “It's been an insane week for Tom Cruise, but at the end of the day, all that's left to say is this: Happy 50th Birthday, Mr. Top Gun -- we've got no doubt you'll be flying high again very soon!”

Turning 50 wasn’t the only thing to celebrate: Forbes has just named Tom Cruise the highest paid actor in the world. His $75 million income for the year ending May 2012 is close to double that of second place actor Leonardo DiCaprio (who topped last year’s chart).

In other Tom Cruise news, the first official trailer for the crime flick Jack Reacher has hit the web and is spreading virally on Google+.

The top 5 most talked about topics on Google+ on July 4 at 7:30 AM GMT are:

Tom Cruise

#BoycottApple

Higgs boson

IGoogle

#Fail