CERN reveals new matter – antimatter difference

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The Large Hadron Collider at CERN

The LHCb collaboration at CERN has made its first observations of matter – antimatter asymmetry in the decays of the particle known as the B0s.

Matter and antimatter are thought to have existed in equal amounts at the beginning of the universe, but today the universe appears to be composed essentially of matter.

Subtle differences

By studying subtle differences in the behaviour of particle and antiparticles, experiments at the LHC are seeking to cast light on this dominance of matter over antimatter.

The LHCb experiment has observed a preference for matter over antimatter known as CP-violation in the decay of neutral B0s particles – only the fourth subatomic particle known to exhibit such behaviour.

”This new discovery reveals another layer in our search to understand what makes antimatter that little bit different to normal matter”
Scientists at the University of Liverpool have played a significant role in contributing to the findings through the construction of the detectors inside the experiment.

The VELO sub-detector is key to selecting Bs mesons from all other particles produced inside LHCb. It has 42 modules containing half-moon-shaped silicon detectors, which were designed, assembled and tested at the University.

The detectors can locate particles to within a hundredth of a millimeter, within millionths of a second. It is this precision that allows physicists to reconstruct the very short flight distance characteristic of a Bs meson, on a timescale that allows this signature to be recognised in real time, so that the data is recorded to make the measurement.

One step further

Professor Tara Shears, part of the LHCb team at the University’s Department of Physics, said: “This new discovery reveals another layer in our search to understand what makes antimatter that little bit different to normal matter.

“It shows us that our understanding of how matter and antimatter behave is remarkably consistent – but also that the differences we’ve seen between them are too small to explain why we live in a universe dominated by matter.

“Understanding the nature of antimatter is still very much an open and important question, and today’s discovery takes us one step further towards our goal.”

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One thought on “CERN reveals new matter – antimatter difference

  1. carl

    the differences between matter and antimatter do not exist,because the antimater doesnt exist in the nature,theantiparticles are exotic phenomenons,produced by the quantic vaccum,through the stronger violations of cp
    encountered due the asymmetry of space and time generated
    the relativistic speeds that produce the spacetime continuos in
    4-dimensional manifolds,tat implies the non-euclidean geometry that is given by torsion:It is left-right handed rotational invariance.then apear the the universe with two torsion:one to right and other to left.

    then the matter,space and time are asymmetrics,turning symmetrics to the connection of space and time to spacetime continuos in the 4-dimensions,that has an induced metrics with noncommututive property.
    theantiparticles are symmetrics of the particles generated
    the operator PT.
    the gravity,then must equal to particles and antiparticles( that is matter in negative states in the quantic vaccum.

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