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Major science news stories, from the BP oil spill to the Chilean miners trapped underground by Catherine McNiff Two scientists checking equipment in the central tube of the LHC. Photo by Antonio Saba courtesy of CERN Related Links Large Hadron Collider Primer on the Physical Sciences 2010 Year in Review 2010 Science News A Deadly Spill in the Gulf of Mexico | A Life Underground in Chile | Water Found on the Moon | How Planets Are Made Why Is the Universe Composed of Matter? A great mystery of the universe is why there is a preponderance of matter over antimatter, and the corollary: how we exist. Based on particle physics' Standard Model, the Big Bang should have produced matter and antimatter in equal amounts. These two would then have destroyed each other, and life as we know it would not exist. Our existence, then, implies the necessity of a new physics—a new physics that scientists now say is being revealed in the results of proton collisions produced at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab). Confirming the New Physics The scientific community—and the larger world—now look to CERN's Large Hadron Collider—a particle accelerator that is bigger and stronger and faster than Fermilab's—to confirm what so far has only been hinted at: the existence of a particle to explain our matter-heavy universe. As the LHC works at top speeds, the scientists will be watching for particles called muons, which are sort of fat electrons, to see if they are produced in greater quantity than anti-muons. Inside Fermilab's accelerator, the muon pairs outnumbered the anti-muon pairs by 1%. Then there are the neutral B-mesons, which are flip-floppers, constantly (as in trillions of times each second) oscillating between states of matter and antimatter. These mesons display a preference toward a matter state. Both the muons and the mesons, then, might contribute to what is called the matter dominance of our universe. What causes the odd behavior of these particles? We will just have to ramp up the LHC and keep our eyes on the moving particles to find out. More from 2010 Science News
.com/news/year-in-review/2010/universe-matter.html
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Major science news stories, from the BP oil spill to the Chilean miners trapped underground
- More from 2010 Science News
Why Is the Universe Composed of Matter?
A great mystery of the universe is why there is a preponderance of matter over antimatter, and the corollary: how we exist. Based on particle physics’ Standard Model, the Big Bang should have produced matter and antimatter in equal amounts. These two would then have destroyed each other, and life as we know it would not exist. Our existence, then, implies the necessity of a new physics—a new physics that scientists now say is being revealed in the results of proton collisions produced at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab).
Two scientists checking equipment in the central tube of the LHC. Photo by Antonio Saba courtesy of CERN
Related Links
- Large Hadron Collider Primer on the Physical Sciences 2010 Year in Review 2010 Science News
Confirming the New Physics
The scientific community—and the larger world—now look to CERN’s Large Hadron Collider—a particle accelerator that is bigger and stronger and faster than Fermilab’s—to confirm what so far has only been hinted at: the existence of a particle to explain our matter-heavy universe.
As the LHC works at top speeds, the scientists will be watching for particles called muons, which are sort of fat electrons, to see if they are produced in greater quantity than anti-muons. Inside Fermilab’s accelerator, the muon pairs outnumbered the anti-muon pairs by 1%.
Then there are the neutral B-mesons, which are flip-floppers, constantly (as in trillions of times each second) oscillating between states of matter and antimatter. These mesons display a preference toward a matter state. Both the muons and the mesons, then, might contribute to what is called the matter dominance of our universe. What causes the odd behavior of these particles? We will just have to ramp up the LHC and keep our eyes on the moving particles to find out.
.com/news/year-in-review/2010/universe-matter.html
Sources +
Our Common Sources
Our Common Sources
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TrendingHere are the facts and trivia that people are buzzing about.
Did Birds Evolve from Dinosaurs?
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Current Events This Week: January 2023
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Andersen’s Fairy Tales: Contents
The Celtic Twilight: A Teller of Tales
- Did Birds Evolve from Dinosaurs?
- The Twelve Dancing Princesses
- Current Events This Week: January 2023
- African Americans by the Numbers
- Andersen’s Fairy Tales: Contents
- The Celtic Twilight: A Teller of Tales
