To understand the universe, the study of the elementary particles of nature in their four types was something like the fundamental basis. That’s why a recent study examining the weight of the W boson, also known as the “messenger,” is causing a stir these days and proposing to rewrite the famous Standard Model of physics, a collection of fundamental data for understanding the W boson Particles and with them our entire universe.
I think. Speaking more slowly to appreciate the importance of this finding, the study that physicists have used to explain universal operation for years needs to be revised.
Yes, these are serious words. We already know.
The Rediscovery of the Messenger
The revolutionary research is published by Science and provides a measurement of the mass of W twice as precise as the previous one, thanks to a study led by the Fermilab Collider Detector Collaboration (CDF) with Spanish participation. Basically, the mass of W shows a surprisingly large deviation from the predictions of the Standard Model of particle physics.
Reviews are nothing new. Physicists have always returned to experiments at large accelerators to try to discover new particles and challenge the Standard Model. But thanks to a method that is twice as precise, they are now surprising even with particles that were thought to be known.
This is one of the heaviest known particles in the universe and has a mass about 80 times that of a proton. After subjecting it to much sharper measurements than before, the international team from the CDF collaboration (Collision Detector at Fermilab Laboratory in Chicago) have now determined that it appears to be heavier than previously determined.
To make this discovery, it took several years and a fairly large team, as usually happens when a real discovery is made. A total of 400 scientists from 23 countries have been involved in data collection and analysis for almost two decades.
The lead author of these latest papers, Dave Toback, a particle physicist at Texas A&M University and spokesman for the US government’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, has been blunt in saying that this “literally means that something fundamental in our understanding of nature is wrong.
For his part, his colleague Joe Lykken prefers to remain cautious and recalls that it is necessary to complete the peer study before starting to rewrite the knowledge on the subject: “Although it is an intriguing result, the measurement must be confirmed by another experiment before it can be fully interpreted,” he said.
In short, what we do know for sure is that changes need to be made: the recent results could show in which directions knowledge about the Standard Model needs to be adjusted, in which areas it should be improved or expanded, and even where are those who do dare to take a new look at the general principles of particle physics, for example at their measurement methods.
But what is the W boson?
The existence of the W boson was theorized in the 1960s and confirmed in 1983 – Carlo Rubbia, former director of CERN, shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Simon van der Meer the following year for their contributions to the discovery of the W and Z bosons .
W is named for weak – weak in English – and is associated with the weak nuclear force, which is one of the four fundamental forces that dominate the behavior of matter in the universe (the other three fundamental forces are electromagnetic, gravitational, and the strong nuclear force, causing the example nuclear energy).
For example, the weak nuclear force is responsible for the processes behind the sun’s brightness or for radioactivity. In fact, thanks to the vast accumulation of data accumulated over decades from high-energy particle collisions at the Tevatron collider at the Fermilab lab in Chicago from 1985 to 2011, it’s now possible to get to the new observations.
the way to go
What is currently on the horizon in particle physics are new experiments to substantiate the new measurement. This was explained by the researchers involved, “since extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, the CDF collaboration’s claim requires additional experiments to provide independent confirmation,” they reiterate.
In addition, it will be important to have an explanation to understand why all previous measurements systematically pointed to a smaller W boson mass. This long road could take several more years and will take place in parallel with a new debate in the scientific community on the subject, probably to arrive at a new theory compatible with the new findings.
Scientists have long known that the Standard Model is imperfect. Doesn’t explain dark matter or gravity well. In fitting the model to these results, physicists must ensure, if at all, that they do so while maintaining the logic of the mathematical equations that now explain and predict other particles and forces well, the researchers said.
It is a readjustment typical of the uncertainty of crises in its most precise form. What is certain is that behind every crisis in a model there is more observation, more precision, more good science. It is constantly looking for a new opportunity for you to gain knowledge.
The Fermilab Collider Detector was a detector that recorded the collisions of high-energy particles produced by the Tevatron Collider (USA). States) for decades. Photos: Fermilab