14 DAY TRIAL // In a paper published on December 22 in the online journal arXiv, investigators with the ATLAS (A Toroidal LHC ApparatuS) experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) announce the discovery of a particle that has never been observed before.
Scientists from the Lancaster University and the University of Birmingham were browsing through the vast volumes of data each experiment on the LHC produces, when they observed the first indications of the new particle in the ATLAS datasets.
What is remarkable about the new particle is that it represents a previously-unknown way of combining a beauty (b) quark and its antiquark together, in a single construct. The particle was named chi b(3P) and is classified as a boson, or force-carrier.
This is the same class of particles as the Higgs boson. The difference between the two is that chi b(3P) is made up of two smaller particles, whereas the Higgs has no smaller components. In the newest boson, the components are held together via the strong nuclear force, the same that binds atomic nuclei.
“Analyzing the billions of particle collisions at the LHC is fascinating. There are potentially all kinds of interesting things buried in the data, and we were lucky to look in the right place at the right time,” explains University of Birmingham PhD student and study team member Andy Chisholm.
“The chi b(3P) is a particle that was predicted by many theorists, but was not observed at previous experiments, such as in my previous work on the D-Zero experiment in Chicago,” explains University of Lancaster research associate Dr. James Walder, an expert in the field.
According to physicists, the lighter partners accompanying chi b(3P) were first observed nearly 25 years ago, but various obstacles and technological limitations have prevented particle physicists from discovering this particular boson, even though they knew it was there.
The discovery is also important because it helps experts test theoretical calculations of the forces that act on fundamental particles. Most of the Standard Model was developed theoretically, before the necessary equipment existed to test predictions, AlphaGalileo reports.
The LHC – which is managed by the European Organization for Nuclear Research beneath the French-Swiss border – was developed specifically to search for the Higgs boson, but also to find as many other particles as possible. Thus far, everything it found was in tune with previous predictions.