PARIS: In a new blow for the futuristic “supersymmetry” theory of the universe´s basic anatomy, experts reported fresh evidence Monday of subatomic activity consistent with the mainstream Standard Model of particle physics.
New data from ultra high-speed proton collisions at Europe´s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) showed an exotic particle dubbed the “beauty quark” behaves as predicted by the Standard Model, said a paper in the journal Nature Physics.
Previous attempts at measuring the beauty quark´s rare transformation into a so-called “up quark” had yielded conflicting results. That prompted scientists to propose an explanation beyond the Standard Model — possibly supersymmetry.
But the latest observations were “entirely consistent with the Standard Model and removes the need for this hypothesis” of an alternative theory, Guy Wilkinson, leader of LHC´s “beauty experiment” told AFP.
“It would of course have been very exciting if we could show that there was something wrong with the Standard Model — I cannot deny that would have been sensational,” he said.
The Standard Model is the mainstream theory of all the fundamental particles that make up matter, and the forces that govern them.
But the model has weaknesses: it doesn´t explain dark matter or dark energy, which jointly make up 95 percent of the universe. Nor is it compatible with Einstein´s theory of general relativity — the force of gravity as we know it does not seem to work at the subatomic quantum scale.
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