particle physics

Two new Baryons at LHC.

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Two new Baryons at LHC.

Two new Baryons at LHCb.
LHCb, the famed experiment at CERN, Switzerland found a year ago two new Baryons. These are important steps in testing the validity of our state of the art understanding of current model of the Physical Universe, mostly in considering the “particle constituents” of the matter around us, and known by the name Standard Model — of Particle Physics.

Atoms with nuclei and electrons. Nucleus has nucleons in it which are two types, protons and neutrons. The protons and neutrons are Baryons with each having two different combination of 3 quarks — uud and udd.

Protons and Neutrons as Baryons, that is an eternal bond of 3 quarks. uud and udd. Note that the spring is the gluon. Much like a spring transmits a mechanical force these gluons have an assigned duty to transfer the strong nuclear forces from one participant to the other.

1. First off it does so by colliding protons with protons at gigantic speeds, at the speed of light. So these protons are 1000 times more energetic than their own mass. If you are 60 kg, your energy is 600 Joule, if you move freely a distance of 1 meter, consider yourself to be thrown so fast that you have 1000 times that energy. Both examples are approximately true.

2. Protons are called Baryons. Anything with 3 quarks in them, as we know them today are called as Baryon. The 3 quarks will never separate into single relationship status. Its a triangular love, in which each partner has their share of love meted out. Sorry particles are decidedly promiscuous. ;) And never break their relations as long as they are bonded this way.

3. These new baryons — 3 quarks in eternal bonding, are about 6 times heavier than proton. SInce protons were bombarded onto each other madly, with energies that are 1000 times bigger than their own mass, the possibility of heavier particles such as these new baryons materialized. So the protons did not break in a way quarks will cry out “I am single again” but rather go into relationships with other quarks and form heavier relationships.

LIGO in India? You must be kidding …

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I was pleasantly surprised that this experiment is slated to come up in India, yes, with a whopping 250 million dollars investment into science in India is perhaps the only 2nd instance of massive science euphoria.

And they are both directly or immediately so, in my field of research, although the first one INO isn’t seeming to be coming of age, while collaborations and Physics and engineering as such have been extensively laid out in the ground, the lab the much coveted international particle physics lab that is, hasn’t come.

(Surprise me, if work has already begun in Madurai, we have been struck by paranoia of environment so much that the elephants have the right of way more than the most innocuous science commies out there, pardon me, that’s a pun, no disrespect to elephants, no offense to commies.)

Waves, particles and Einstein !

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Waves are something that have no mass and move at the maximum speed, mass m = 0. speed c = 1. So whats their momentum? p = m.v = 0? Right?

No. For pure waves; momentum does not come from mass. It comes only from motion.

(pure wave; they do not have mass)

For matter waves, on the other hand, momentum comes in two ways, mass as well as motion.

(impure, now they have mass)

Albert Einstein recognized this fact and derived his relation; $latex E = \sqrt {(pc)^2+(mc^2)^2}$

This relation is called as Einstein’s relativistic equation, also Einstein’s mass-energy relation. But more appropriately mass-energy-momentum relation.

Let us consider E as the hypotenuse, p and m; as base or perpendicular as is your choice.

triangle_copyThen $latex E = \sqrt {(pc)^2+(mc^2)^2}$ is Pythagoras Theorem; when p is momentum and m is mass.

For pure waves such as photon … the quanta of light, m = 0.

Hence the Pythagorean Triangle is now one, where the mass side is arbitrary small. Thus E = p.

3 myths of physics, especially in textbooks.

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2. Last year in a text book in Indian High School curriculum, I spotted and corrected with my students, the following:

Myth; there are only 3 quarks that have been detected or FOUND/confirmed so far, in nature.

Its based on a knowledge that was true more than 3 decades ago. All quarks, 6 of them, have been confirmed as hypothesized, the last of them was confirmed 2 decades ago. So there is really no reason why these facts should have been omitted from the text books that are updated every few years as such. Who are our experts?

3. During my freelance research, I have pointed out the following fact within last 3 or 2 years. A recurring myth in very advance texts of physics, concurrently followed in major and wide number of universities around the world, some of the finest texts in the field of particle physics and widely believed to be excellent, which they are nonetheless.

Myth; (particle life time and range of forces) A (force carrier) particle is long range if its mass is zero. Lifetime is the uncertainty that gives rise to an energy which is equivalenced through Einstein’s mass-energy relation and mass being zero, we have an infinite range as range is inversely proportional.

Fact; This is murky waters. Its a manipulation of sorts. Experimentally life times are quite arbitrary, while mass is supposedly fixed. Neutrino has a mean-life from 15 seconds to 10 billion seconds in order of magnitude .. I have hypothesized that’s possible, because it has such a high energy, and given it can’t lose this energy via any possible processes, it must live that long.