Atom Smasher Detects Hints of New Unstable Particle
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world's largest atom smasher, just discovered at least two previously unknown particles.
The 17-mile (27 kilometers) underground ring near Geneva recently discovered two baryons and a hint of another particle, according to a statement from the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), which runs the LHC. Baryons are fundamental subatomic particles that are each made up of three quarks. The quarks, in turn, are even smaller particles that come in different "flavors": up, down, top, bottom, strange and charm.
[...] The first, named Σb(6097)+, is made up of one bottom quark and two up quarks, while the second, named Σb(6097)-, is made up of one bottom quark and two down quarks. [...] As for the third potential particle, the researchers discovered only hints that it exists. Named Z sub c-(4100), this particle could be a weird meson, a type of unstable particle that briefly flits into existence during high-energy collisions and that consists of two quarks and two antiquarks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @04:52PM (4 children)
Since when has this character displayed an interest in particle physics?
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday October 04 2018, @05:38PM
He read "Large Hard-on Collider" and wanted to make it clear that hand size and penis size are in no way correlated and that he had no problems with either, nope, nosirre, ignore that lying skank Stormy Daniels...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:17PM (1 child)
People with parody accounts but no real accounts are the real criminals.
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Friday October 05 2018, @03:02AM
His other account is AC
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by exaeta on Friday October 05 2018, @12:24AM
Somehow I have a feeling "real Donald Trump" isn't really Donald Trump. Just saying...
The Government is a Bird
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @05:14PM (17 children)
These are just new short-lived combinations of particles:
A new particle would merit a new box on here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Standard_Model_of_Elementary_Particles.svg [wikipedia.org]
It sounds like one is just a proton with the down quark swapped with a bottom quark:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Proton_quark_structure.svg [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by bob_super on Thursday October 04 2018, @05:18PM (2 children)
You see, we used to crash the two cars at 50MPH and observe the radiator/bumper hybrid element.
Now we crash the cars at 100MPH, so we've discovered a new turbo/piston hybrid element.
We're hoping to ramp up to 200MPH, where the fabled crankshaft/injector is rumored to exist.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @05:47PM (1 child)
No, that's just looking at fragments of the originals. If you want a proper analogy, you crash two Chevys at high speed and you get out two Chevys and a Prius.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @07:22PM
Not really.
You crash two chevys at high speed. When you examing the burning and smoking wreckage you claim it looks sort of like some other chinese cars were part of the crash so they must have been there at some stage but they are cars so badly made they immediately and spontaneously fell apart.
See, makes perfect sense..and totally believable...and not just that these particles are smooshed together for a short while sort of like when you hold two magnets together or tow solar systems pass through each other...
Because Occam's chainsaw and stuff.
A prius would involve new components such as batteries...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:03PM
New exhibits for the particle zoo.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:13PM (9 children)
That was my first thought as well - but those are specifically *elementary* particles - not even protons and neutrons are included. And those are definitely particles in their own right - just not elementary ones.
Those elementary particles can be combined in*many* different ways, and the resulting particles will have different properties than the paltry two we're accustomed to. Actually producing such particles and studying their properties is a challenge in its own right, and there's no telling what we may learn, especially if any end up revealing properties or decay patterns that conflict with established theory. We may even discover some with properties useful enough to justify the expense of synthesizing them in larger quantities.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:21PM (7 children)
So if there is 680 possible 3-way combinations of 17 particles, they can write all those down. The "discovery" has already occurred at that point. Instead they should use the term "detected", or "created".
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:31PM (5 children)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraquark [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentaquark [wikipedia.org]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:35PM
Fine 680 + 2380 + 6188 = 9248 combinations. Have a computer "write them down".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:38PM (3 children)
There are 131, 071 possible combinations of 17 particles in sets of 1:17. So I just discovered more particles than anyone else in history.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:52PM (2 children)
Your Nobel Peace Prize is in the mail.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @07:01PM (1 child)
Also, isn't 17 the "Q-th" letter of the alphabet? Another Q-proof.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @07:13PM
QAnon = John de Lancie
(Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Thursday October 04 2018, @07:12PM
No - because at that point they've only been predicted, not discovered. Much like the Uu... elements in the periodic table - their existence was predicted decades ago, but they're weren't considered "discovered" (nor properly named) until someone actually manages to synthesize one of them.
Just because something is predicted, doens't mean it exists. There might be a flaw in the theory, or they might require impossibly unlikely conditions to form. In fact, a big part of the motivation to actually create such things is to confirm that the theory actually holds under more extreme scenarios than we ca easily test (or perhaps more accurately, the motivation is to hopefully find some way in which the prediction is flawed, and thus another clue towards forming a better, and hopefully more satisfying, theory)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 04 2018, @08:06PM
That was my thought: if these new quark combos are even meta-stable, they may well have some interesting characteristics not seen in our normal particle repertoire. For instance, if a stream of Σb(6097)+ directed into a main sequence hydrogen fusing star can rapidly accelerate the process of iron creation, that could be useful when we're invaded by a hostile neighboring solar system...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Spamalope on Thursday October 04 2018, @06:36PM (2 children)
The question is does this help answer fundamental questions? Does it lead towards a grand unified theory, or deeper understanding of gravity that could help? (for example) We might not know the answer until we're looking back having figured those things out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 04 2018, @11:09PM (1 child)
No. The only question it answers is "How many billion dollars does it take for a particle physicist to change a lightbulb?"
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Saturday October 06 2018, @10:00AM
None. That's a job for the interns / postgrads. The particle physicist will just accelerate the old and new light bulbs up close to the speed of light until they smash together and then write about the little pieces of broken glass in a paper.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Thursday October 04 2018, @07:42PM (1 child)
Fuck Sigma Beta!
Just sayin'
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Thursday October 04 2018, @07:52PM
Well shit, I was trying to make a joke about the particle name. I didn't realize that was an organization.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Friday October 05 2018, @02:26AM (5 children)
Hopefully this will lead to some useful new technology such as warp drive, phasers, teleporters, or best of all, a holodeck.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Friday October 05 2018, @04:17PM (2 children)
Yeah. I at least allow myself to hope that if they keep on discovering new physics that the find it on one of these occasions. For me FTL is the one that really matters.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Saturday October 06 2018, @03:29AM (1 child)
The holodeck would let you experience any reality you desire.
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Saturday October 06 2018, @09:51AM
True, but I'm hopeful a good approximation of that experience will be possible with current physics. Advances in virtual reality or brain or nerve interfaces could get it done if we can't crack fully realistic holographic projection.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @02:03AM (1 child)
With the holodeck, could I lick Kim Kardashian's brown, crusty butthole?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @10:46AM
Depends. You'd have to check Starfleet's Code of Conduct and the Federation's intellectual property laws, or reprogram it yourself and risk an extended stay in the brig...