November 3, 2008

Forget the LHC, the Aging Tevatron May Have Uncovered Some New Physics

Written by Ian O'Neill

The Collider Detector at Fermilab may have found some unexpected particles (Fermilab)

If you thought any quantum discoveries would have to wait until the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is switched back on in 2009, you'd be wrong. Just because the LHC represents the next stage in particle accelerator evolution does not mean the world's established and long-running accelerator facilities have already closed shop and left town. It would appear that the Tevatron particle accelerator at Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois, has discovered…

…something.

Scientists at the Tevatron are reluctant to hail new results from the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) as a "new discovery" as they simply do not know what their results suggest. During collisions between protons and anti-protons, the CDF was monitoring the decay of bottom quarks and bottom anti-quarks into muons. However, CDF scientists uncovered something strange. Too many muons were being generated by the collisions, and muons were popping into existence outside the beam pipe…

Full article here:

http://www.universetoday.com/2008/11/03/forget-the-lhc-the-aging-tevatron-may-have-uncovered-some-new-physics/