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Physicists Abuzz About Possible New Particle as CERN Revs Up

In a surprise development in December, two separate LHC detectors each turned up faint signs that could indicate a new particle.
Image: A technician works on the CMS detector, part of the CERN LHC experiment
A technician works on the CMS detector, part of the CERN LHC experiment on September 2, 2014 in Geneva, Switzerland. The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), which has 21 member states, has built amongst other experiments the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The world's largest atom collider has been investigating antimatter, dark matter and the creation of the universe. Built around a 27 kilometre underground ring of superconducting magnets where two high-energy particle beams travel at close to the speed of light in opposite directions before they are made to collide at four particle detectors. (Photo by Harold Cunningham/Getty Images)Harold Cunningham / Getty Images, file
By Associated Press

Was it a blip, or a breakthrough?

Scientists around the globe are revved up with excitement as the world's biggest atom smasher — best known for revealing the Higgs boson four years ago — starts whirring again to churn out data that may confirm cautious hints of an entirely new particle.

Such a discovery would all but upend the most basic understanding of physics, experts say.

Read More: 'God Particle': New CERN Experiments Shed More Light on Higgs Boson

The European Center for Nuclear Research, or CERN by its French-language acronym, has in recent months given more oomph to the machinery in a 17-mile underground circuit along the French-Swiss border known as the Large Hadron Collider.

In a surprise development in December, two separate LHC detectors each turned up faint signs that could indicate a new particle, and since then theorizing has been rife.

"It's a hint at a possible discovery," said theoretical physicist Csaba Csaki, who isn't involved in the experiments. "If this is really true, then it would possibly be the most exciting thing that I have seen in particle physics in my career — more exciting than the discovery of the Higgs itself."

Read More: LHC Experiment Hints at Possibility of New Particle

After a wintertime break, the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, reopened on March 25 to prepare for a restart in early May. CERN scientists are doing safety tests and scrubbing clean the pipes before slamming together large bundles of particles in hopes of producing enough data to clear up that mystery. Firm answers aren't expected for weeks, if not until an August conference of physicists in Chicago known as ICHEP.

On Friday, the LHC was temporarily immobilized by a weasel, which invaded a transformer that helps power the machine and set off an electrical outage. CERN says it was one of a few small glitches that will delay by a few days plans to start the data collection at the $4.4 billion collider.

The 2012 confirmation of the Higgs boson, dubbed the "God particle" by some laypeople, culminated a theory first floated decades earlier. The "Higgs" rounded out the Standard Model of physics, which aims to explain how the universe is structured at the infinitesimal level.

Associated Press

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