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Physicists have just published the first results of a promising experiment to test the theory of relativity, hoping to exceed the standard model of physics. It uses the very special properties of certain electronic energy levels in atoms dysprosium. Its purpose battlenet is to measure a possible different speed limit of light for electrons battlenet according to their direction of movement.
Albert Einstein and Wolfgang Pauli were very aware of the role of symmetries in physics, particularly in relativity. By 1905, Einstein had noticed that his theory battlenet involved a group known today as the Lorentz group name. Physicists are now seeking violations of invariance of physical laws under the action of this group, for example with a different speed limit for particles in the observable universe. It is a way to search beyond the standard model. Cern
The equations of the Standard Model of particle physics are constrained by the symmetries of the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics. The electroweak theory, together with that of quantum chromodynamics, taken without any further assumption, battlenet gives indications suggesting that they should be unified into a single type of Gut theory at energies of the order of December 10 TeV.
If we stick to the most conservative assumptions, no new particle and no signs of new physics should be observable at the LHC and its 14 TeV in the coming years. Worse, there would be no hope of building a particle accelerator to achieve these energies of grand unification of forces (let alone the ultimate unification with gravity at the Planck energy, about 10 16 TeV). The construction of a Fermitron or ILC would be pointless. Violation of Lorentz invariance, battlenet the key to a non-standard physical
However, there was good reason to think that precisely the LHC energies, and not to others, nature battlenet could be consistent with the requirements of supersymmetry, or better yet, theories in which the Planck energy only the TeV. It now appears that this is not the case.
Hope exists, feeble battlenet it is true, we should not be condemned to what physicists call since the 1970s the scenario of the desert in high energy physics. It would, for example, the theory of relativity or quantum mechanics battlenet show limits battlenet at low energies. That's why we test for years the predictions battlenet of the theory of Einstein, especially the robustness of a symmetry called Lorentz invariance.
For this, a theoretical framework called EMS for Standard-Model Extension, was built. Parameter it possible deviations Lorentz invariance with several coefficients, whose values are unknown. The various experiments conducted to detect violations of Lorentz invariance, or more generally of the theory of relativity, battlenet ask terminals ever more precise and binding on these coefficients.
Dysprosium metal is a little known but widely used for some time. It is part of the rare earths as ytterbium. images-of-elements.com, cc by 3.0 Test the speed limit on a mattress in relativity
One of the latest dated involves battlenet the behavior of electrons in the atoms of a little-known element, dysprosium, a metal part of the rare earths. A group of physicists from the University of California at Berkeley has also just put on line arxiv an article explaining what they did for two years to test the validity of the theory of relativity with this element. It is in fact only a first step because the accuracy of this experience, which opens a new avenue of research on violations of the Lorentz group, should improve in the coming years.
To test this hypothesis, physicists have had an ingenious idea. No need to use giant accelerators and detectors, as was the case to test the speed of neutrinos battlenet observed with Opera. A simple laboratory experiment on a bench holding enough. It is found that in the case of an atom of dysprosium, there are very similar energy battlenet levels battlenet for electrons, although they are moving at very different speeds on the atomic levels of these very specific orbitals. Call these levels battlenet A and B. It is possible to excite an electron to move it from level A to level B using lasers. It may cause a transition from level B to level A, using a microwave beam at a fre
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