Scientists bolster evidence of new physics in Muon g-2 experiment
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Scientists are testing our fundamental understanding of the universe, and there's much more to discover. What do touch screens, radiation therapy and shrink wrap have in common? They were all made possible by particle physics research. Discoveries of how the universe works at the smallest scale often lead to huge advances in technology we use every day.
Scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, along with collaborators from 46 other institutions and seven countries, are conducting an experiment to put our current understanding of the universe to the test. The first result points to the existence of undiscovered particles or forces. This new physics could help explain long-standing scientific mysteries, and the new insight adds to a storehouse of information that scientists can tap into when modeling our universe and developing new technologies.
The experiment, Muon g-2 (pronounced Muon g minus 2), follows one that began in the '90s at DOE's Brookhaven National Laboratory, in which scientists measured a magnetic property of a fundamental particle called the muon.
The Brookhaven experiment yielded a result that differed from the value predicted by the Standard Model, scientists' best description of the makeup and behavior of the universe yet. The new experiment is a recreation of Brookhaven's, built to challenge or affirm the discrepancy with higher precision.
The Standard Model very precisely predicts the muon's g-factor -- a value that tells scientists how this particle behaves in a magnetic field. This g-factor is known to be close to the value two, and the experiments measure their deviation from two, hence the name Muon g-2. The experiment at Brookhaven indicated that g-2 differed from the theoretical prediction by a few parts per million. This miniscule difference hinted at the existence of unknown interactions between the muon and the magnetic field -- interactions that could involve new particles or forces.
The first result from the new experiment strongly agrees with Brookhaven's, strengthening the evidence that there is new physics to discover. The combined results from Fermilab and Brookhaven show a difference from the Standard Model at a significance of 4.2 sigma (or standard deviations), slightly less than the 5 sigma that scientists require to claim a discovery, but still compelling evidence of new physics. The chance that the results are a statistical fluctuation is about 1 in 40,000.
Particles beyond the Standard Model could help to explain puzzling phenomena in physics, such as the nature of dark matter, a mysterious and pervasive substance that physicists know exists but have yet to detect.
"This is an incredibly exciting result," said Argonne's Ran Hong, a postdoctoral appointee who worked on the Muon g-2 experiment for over four years. "These findings could have major implications for future particle physics experiments and could lead to a stronger grasp on how the universe works."
The Argonne team of scientists contributed significantly to the success of the experiment. The original team, assembled and led by physicist Peter Winter, included Argonne's Hong and Simon Corrodi, as well as Suvarna Ramachandran and Joe Grange, who have since left Argonne. "This team has an impressive and unique skill set with high expertise regarding hardware, operational planning and data analysis," said Winter, who leads the Muon g-2 contributions from Argonne. "They made vital contributions to the experiment, and we could not have obtained these results without their work."
To derive the muon's true g-2, the scientists at Fermilab produce beams of muons that travel in a circle through a large, hollow ring in the presence of a strong magnetic field. This field keeps the muons in the ring and causes the direction of a muon's spin to rotate. The rotation, which scientists call precession, is similar to the rotati...
