LHC Team Detects Signals From the "Zeptoverse"
A Cambridge-led team working at the Large Hadron Collider has seen signals from a scale 100 billion times smaller than an atom. The scientists involved say the UK's place in the follow-up work is now uncertain, because the government's research funder has pulled out of the planned upgrade.
A short-lived particle
The signal comes from a collision experiment. Particles were smashed together at high energy, and the team studied what flew out. One product was a beauty quark, a particle smaller than an atom.
It is unstable. It lasts about one and a half trillionths of a second before it breaks down into other forms. Even so, the team picked up its interactions with neighbouring particles on a scale of a billion-trillionth of a metre. Some physicists call that realm the zeptoverse.
Where dark matter comes in
Dark matter makes up a large part of the cosmos, but researchers have struggled to detect it. Scientists know it exists because its gravity acts on ordinary matter. In every other respect it stays invisible.
Some theories say particles at the zeptoverse scale are more sensitive to dark matter. If so, it could shape how quarks interact and decay, so watching that activity could eventually reveal it.
"We're knocking on the door of this zeptoverse," said Dr Harry Cliff of Cambridge University, who led the data analysis. He wants more data in order to find what new particles are waiting there.
The machine and the stakes
The experiment sits at the LHC, run by Cern on the Swiss-French border. It breaks atoms apart to see what they contain. If it holds, the result could feed into a fuller theory of how the Universe works.
An upgrade without a UK share
The 28 countries in the project agreed a £150m upgrade of the LHCb detector. It would raise the frequency of these decays tenfold. Cliff says it would let the team probe inside the zeptoverse.
Earlier this year UK Research and Innovation, which allocates the government's research money, said it would withdraw its share. The same announcement cut several other particle physics and astronomy projects, among them Jodrell Bank's Lovell telescope. The cuts come despite a record rise in the overall science budget.
UKRI told the BBC it remains a fully engaged member of Cern and its second largest funder, at around £175m a year. A spokesperson said there were more promising funding applications than it could support.
Researchers weigh their options
Prof Tim Gershon, who leads the LHCb collaboration, said the UK's full involvement is in doubt. He singled out lost training for young people as the biggest long-term effect.
Dr Mary Richardson-Slipper, part of the team behind the result, is one of those early-career researchers. She is looking at jobs abroad and says "lots" of colleagues in fundamental physics have already left.
Prof Brian Cox of the University of Manchester, who is not on the team, called the result "important". He criticised the cut to UK funding for the Cern project and said walking away from UK scientific leadership would be extraordinary.
Our view
Cliff says the next step needs much more data, and the upgrade is what would supply it. The report does not say whether UKRI will reconsider. Whether it does will shape how fully UK groups take part in the next stage, and whether early-career researchers like Richardson-Slipper look elsewhere.
Source: BBC News