In the news

From Science, April 15, 2020: Neutrinos behave differently from their antimatter counterparts, antineutrinos, report physicists on the T2K experiment. The result is far from conclusive, but the asymmetry, known as CP violation, could help explain how the newborn universe generated more matter than antimatter. NOvA spokesperson Patricia Vahle of William & Mary comments on the T2K result and NOvA’s measurements of CP violation. When the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, hosted by Fermilab, comes online, it will be able to make more precise measurements of neutrinos’ behavior.

From New Scientist, April 15, 2020: Differences between matter and antimatter, called CP violation, have been measured in some particles, called quarks, but the level isn’t nearly enough to explain the observed imbalance between matter and antimatter. The T2K collaboration has observed hints that CP violation in neutrinos may be able to make up the difference. DUNE spokesperson Ed Blucher of the University of Chicago comments on the result.

From Nature, April 15, 2020: In a mirror world, antiparticles should behave in the same way as particles. But it emerges that neutrinos, electrons and their more exotic cousins might not obey this expected pattern. Fermilab scientist Jessica Turner and Durham University scientist Silvia Pascoli provide a commentary on T2K’s recent neutrino result, CP violation, and how other neutrino experiments, including the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, hosted by Fermilab, will make more precise measurements of the mysterious neutrino’s behavior.

From The New York Times, April 15, 2020: An international team of 500 physicists from 12 countries, known as the T2K collaboration, reported that they had measured a slight but telling difference between neutrinos and their opposites, antineutrinos. Fermilab Deputy Director Joe Lykken comments on the result and how the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, hosted by Fermilab, may be able to make a definitive discovery of CP violation.

From Nature Physics, April 6, 2020: The Physics Beyond Colliders study was launched three years ago to explore the future physics projects below the high-energy frontier, including explorations of the dark sector and precision measurements of strongly interacting processes. The methodology employed to compare the reach of those projects has raised interest in the collider, neutrino and nonaccelerator communities.

From Quanta Magazine, March 30, 2020: Three progressively heavier copies of each type of matter particle exist, and no one knows why. A new paper by Steven Weinberg takes a stab at explaining the pattern, and summarizes a paper by Fermilab scientists Bogdan Dobrescu and Patrick Fox on the spread of the particles’ masses.

From Nature Physics, April 2020: Fermilab scientist Pushpa Bhat and her University of Melbourne scientist Geoffrey Taylor discuss particle physics experiments in the United States and Asia and how interest in the development of next-generation colliders has been rekindled.

From Semiconductor Engineering, April 6, 2020: Fermilab, Brookhaven National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have built an enormous superconducting magnet — one of 16 — that will be used in the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator project at CERN in Europe.

From Physics World, April 3, 2020: A collaboration that includes Fermilab scientists is exploring how quantum computing could be used to analyze the vast amount of data produced by experiments on the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. The researchers have shown that a “quantum support vector machine” can help physicists make sense out of the huge amounts of information generated at CERN.

From Astronomy, March 31, 2020: Astronomers have discovered 139 new minor planets orbiting the Sun beyond Neptune by searching through data from the Dark Energy Survey, which is led by Fermilab. The new method for spotting small worlds is expected to reveal many thousands of distant objects in coming years — meaning these first hundred or so are likely just the tip of the iceberg.