Scientists may confirm the existence of a ‘new force’ that will help unravel the universe and its mysteries better
“What will happen if scientists discover new laws of physics that reset our understanding of the working of the universe?”
“The physics section of the IIT-JEE exam will become much more difficult to solve.”
This was the joke doing rounds in social media after researchers at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) near Geneva reported an unusual signal in their data that could be the first hint of a new kind of physics.
There is nothing physicists love more than proving a theory wrong. Two recent experiments have done exactly that — exposing the chinks in a well-established theory of particle physics called Standard Model and thereby raising hopes of heralding a new era in physics.
This is an exciting time for particle physicists around the world. We may be tantalisingly close to discovering a new fundamental force that interacts differently with the subatomic particles. The experiments by CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear Research) at LHC, a giant collider machine built in a 27 km-long circular tunnel underneath the French-Swiss border, have thrown up results that challenge the conventional understanding of the behaviour of particles. The LHC smashes together beams of proton particles to probe the limits of physics as we know it.
The discovery of a new force in nature is the holy grail of particle physics. The CERN scientists may well be closer to confirming the existence of such a force that will help fill the gaps in the present understanding of the universe and unravel its mysteries such as dark matter and dark energy.
Our current understanding of the constituents of the universe falls remarkably short – we do not know what 95% of the universe is made of or why there is such a large imbalance between matter and antimatter.
As of today, the Standard Model is considered the closest humanity has come to explaining how the building blocks of the universe behave. However, it cannot explain everything we observe about the world around us. It says nothing, for example, about dark matter – the mysterious stuff that makes up some 27% of the universe nor can it explain the nature of gravity. Physicists know that it must eventually be replaced by a more advanced framework.
Much of the cosmos, it is believed, consists of dark energy, a force that appears to be driving the expansion of the universe, and dark matter, a mysterious substance that seems to hold the cosmic web of matter in place like an invisible skeleton.
The LHC was built to discover physics beyond the Standard Model. Scientists at CERN are searching for hints of new physical phenomena which could lead the way to a deeper understanding of the cosmos.
After analysing trillions of collisions produced over the last decade, we may now be seeing evidence of something altogether new, potentially the carrier of a brand-new force of nature.
The Standard Model maintains that the subatomic particles, the building blocks of matter, should break down into products that include electrons at exactly the same rate as they do into products that include a heavier cousin of the electron, a particle called a muon.
But the results released by CERN suggest that something unusual is happening. Instead of producing electrons and muons at the same rate, nature appears to favour the route that ends with electrons.
The LHC produces sub-atomic particles called “beauty quarks” which undergo a process known as decay, where one particle transforms into several, less massive ones. According to the Standard Model, beauty quarks should decay into equal numbers of electron and muon particles. Instead, the process yields more electrons than muons.
This could mean that an as-yet-undiscovered particle or force was involved in the decay process and made it easier to produce electrons. If the latest results are confirmed by further experiments, they will represent an important discovery.
Scientists at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in the United States have found that muons, which are like electrons but 200 times heavier, wobble more than they should when passed through an intense magnetic field. This means that the muons are defying laws of Physics. This may point to there being a fifth fundamental force present. Unknown matter or energy is making the muons wobble in unexpected ways.
As per our current understanding, there are four fundamental forces in nature: gravity, electromagnetism, weak force and strong force. The strange behaviour of muons points to there being a fifth fundamental force. If true, this has the potential of fundamentally changing our understanding of things, both in our surroundings and in the universe.
The results of experiments at LHC and Fermilab amount to the biggest clue so far that physical particles or properties exist beyond the Standard Model. To figure out what lies beyond the Standard Model, physicists have long tried to push it to its breaking point in lab experiments.
These experiments have exposed the inconsistencies and limitations of the Standard Model of particle physics. Though the scientific community has been able to predict extraordinary physical truths using the Standard Model, it has been constructed in such a way that several essential theories in physics have been left unaccounted for. For instance, no one has ever been able to use the Standard Model to explain gravitation and general relativity using quantum field theory, nor has anyone been able to reconcile quantum field theory with the new prominent theories of cosmology.
If what we are seeing is really the harbinger of some new fundamental particles, then it will finally be the breakthrough that physicists have been searching for decades.
We will have finally seen a part of the larger picture that lies beyond the Standard Model, which ultimately could allow us to unravel any number of established mysteries. These include the nature of the invisible dark matter that fills the universe. It could even help theorists unify the fundamental particles and forces.
Only time and rigorous experiments will tell if we have finally seen the first glimmer of what lies beyond our current understanding of particle physics.
(The author is a senior journalist based in Hyderabad)
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