investigator at Fermilab have tried to reproduce an intriguing result from the 1990s that indicated the existence of a subatomic particle that should n’t be there . And , excitingly , these follow - up experiment were able-bodied to confirm that something is indeed going on . It is too early to call this a breakthrough but researchers have emphatically found an crucial tension point between theory and recitation .
The young project is calledMiniBooNEand it follow up the depth psychology conducted between 1993 and 1997 by the Liquid Scintillator Neutrino Detector . According to the possibility , there are three type of neutrino – teeny particle that slip away through topic without interact with it – and they have no mass . Each member of the triplet can plough into any other , a notion known as neutrino oscillation . This is quite freaky but thing are ( as always ) a second more complicated than they seem . Neutrinos , as it turns out , do actually have mass .
The hypothesis has been pick off to allow for this mass but some researchers have come up with a different approach . They propose the existence of a fresh and unlike case of neutrino : the unfertile neutrino . The sterile neutrino is expected to only interact via soberness and could be responsible for other unknown phenomenon like sullen matter . It is potential that multiple types of unfertile neutrinos survive , although this is n’t clear .
The results from MiniBooNE , presently being equal - reviewed and usable onarXiv , show a stronger neutrino oscillation signal than what is expect in theory . It is not a direct signal detection of a unexampled particle , but at the same time , the supernumerary signal appear to be truly there . Several scientist stay skeptical about the anomaly , and some suggest that good constraint would serve clarify .
Also , sterile neutrinos are not the only explanation . The Liquid Scintillator Neutrino Detector ’s information did n’t meet potential masses for sterile neutrinos fromcosmic sources . Other violations of the possibility might be at work here .
Despite tension such as this , the stock manakin of particle physical science is one of the good hypothesis in science . It is used to excuse fundamental particle and forces and it helped us predict material like the Higgs boson . We have it off it is modified , graveness is not part of it , for example , but it has so far survive the test of experimentation with only minor tweaking . But this might not be for long .
