21–30 of 37 posts
I suppose this is the particle physics equivalent of 'discovering' heavier and heavier elements in the periodic table -- good evidence towards existing theory, but effectively these are artificial constructions that exist only briefly and never (?) outside lab conditions.
It's more akin to 'discovering' new nuclear isomers that are predicted but have never been observed.
Why does nobody include the particle name in the heading? Supersymmetry?!? Click. Nope, some pseudo particle or a bunch of quarks.
"0b" [that's a copy paste, the Xi doesn't appear, the super and subscript letters do, the pi doesn't show] I'm going to guess that is why? Though the OP does say "The discovery of the particles, known as Xi_b'- and Xi_b*-, were announced by CERN [...]" 𝛯′⁻ works in unicode, but I can't get the subscript b nor superscript asterisk in there (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_subscripts_and_superscr... ).
Why does nobody include the particle name in the heading? Supersymmetry?!? Click. Nope, some pseudo particle or a bunch of quarks.
"0b" [that's a copy paste, the Xi doesn't appear, the super and subscript letters do, the pi doesn't show] I'm going to guess that is why? Though the OP does say "The discovery of the particles, known as Xi_b'- and Xi_b*-, were announced by CERN [...]" 𝛯′⁻ works in unicode, but I can't get the subscript b nor superscript asterisk in there (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_subscripts_and_superscr... ).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes. It's somewhat shameful that we physicists still call these constructs 'particles' as to the lay person this still implies some sort of fundamental nature. They are actually predicted constructs of still smaller particles that only appear momentarily at sufficiently high energy. That said, it is important, interesting research because if there are important deviations from the standard model, it is likely to be h…
> It's somewhat shameful that we physicists still call these constructs 'particles' Are they any less particle-like than an electron? Than a proton? Even though a proton isn't fundamental, it's still considered a particle.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's more akin to 'discovering' new nuclear isomers that are predicted but have never been observed.
[deleted]
A bit off-topic, but I was recently recommended the documentary "Particle Fever" by someone here on HN. I can now highly, highly recommend it as well. Really puts this whole thing in perspective!
In case people are wondering about the impact of this, it's not very interesting (to non particle physcists) unless something unexpected about these particles is found later, as these particles were predicted by the Standard Model. The exact mass splittings, of course, are useful to validate (and further improve) theoretical models of QCD. What I find more interesting is that LHCb is licensing their eprint as CC-BY-4…
CERN additionally funds the open-access fees for papers to help them offset publishing costs over the life of the paper.
http://cds.cern.ch/record/1955574/files/CERN-OPEN-2014-049.p...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
"0b" [that's a copy paste, the Xi doesn't appear, the super and subscript letters do, the pi doesn't show] I'm going to guess that is why? Though the OP does say "The discovery of the particles, known as Xi_b'- and Xi_b*-, were announced by CERN [...]" 𝛯′⁻ works in unicode, but I can't get the subscript b nor superscript asterisk in there (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_subscripts_and_superscr... ).
I don't see a subscript-b in Unicode anywhere.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
[deleted]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_isomer