1 00:00:06,840 --> 00:00:09,360 Speaker 1: He or Hey, did you hear there was a big 2 00:00:09,400 --> 00:00:14,080 Speaker 1: discovery and it involved the word penguins? I didn't. Was 3 00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:16,720 Speaker 1: it at the South Pole? Actually it wasn't. Was it 4 00:00:16,720 --> 00:00:22,200 Speaker 1: about actual penguins? Not that either. Was it even about birds? No, 5 00:00:22,440 --> 00:00:26,160 Speaker 1: it wasn't. Let me guess something in particle physics. Yeah, 6 00:00:26,239 --> 00:00:29,120 Speaker 1: you got it. Yeah that makes sense. Name a discovery. 7 00:00:29,240 --> 00:00:31,560 Speaker 1: What's a name that has absolutely nothing to do with 8 00:00:31,600 --> 00:00:34,960 Speaker 1: the actual discovery. But penguins is just so much fun 9 00:00:35,000 --> 00:00:37,280 Speaker 1: to say. Yeah, they're fun to look at too, they're 10 00:00:37,280 --> 00:00:54,640 Speaker 1: pretty cute birds. I am or Hammack, cartoonist and the 11 00:00:54,680 --> 00:00:58,520 Speaker 1: creator of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist, 12 00:00:58,560 --> 00:01:01,360 Speaker 1: and I wish I could swim like penguin. Really, they're 13 00:01:01,440 --> 00:01:04,360 Speaker 1: so elegant underwater. I mean, they're this incredible animal that 14 00:01:04,480 --> 00:01:06,760 Speaker 1: just like waddle around so awkwardly on land. But then 15 00:01:06,800 --> 00:01:09,560 Speaker 1: you see them in the water and they look like birds. Right, 16 00:01:09,600 --> 00:01:11,880 Speaker 1: they fly through the water the way other birds fly 17 00:01:11,959 --> 00:01:13,880 Speaker 1: through the air. It's gorgeous. Yeah, but then you have 18 00:01:13,920 --> 00:01:17,640 Speaker 1: to walk like a penguin on land. As your wife 19 00:01:17,680 --> 00:01:20,679 Speaker 1: approved this wish fulfillment, Well, I wear a tuxedo around 20 00:01:20,680 --> 00:01:22,120 Speaker 1: the house all the time just to sort of like 21 00:01:22,200 --> 00:01:24,680 Speaker 1: break it in. Yeah, and you eat raw fish too, 22 00:01:25,120 --> 00:01:27,639 Speaker 1: But anyways, Welcome to our podcast, Daniel and Jorge Explain 23 00:01:27,680 --> 00:01:30,160 Speaker 1: the Universe, a production of I Heart Radio, in which 24 00:01:30,160 --> 00:01:32,920 Speaker 1: we waddle our way around the unknown mysteries of the 25 00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:35,640 Speaker 1: universe trying to figure out what they mean. We talk 26 00:01:35,720 --> 00:01:38,520 Speaker 1: about the craziest little particles, We talk about the things 27 00:01:38,520 --> 00:01:41,240 Speaker 1: in deepest space. We talk about the hottest things and 28 00:01:41,280 --> 00:01:44,720 Speaker 1: the coldest things and everything in between. Because this podcast 29 00:01:44,800 --> 00:01:48,120 Speaker 1: is all about explaining the entire universe to you, that's right, 30 00:01:48,160 --> 00:01:50,200 Speaker 1: because there is a lot out there to discover and 31 00:01:50,280 --> 00:01:52,840 Speaker 1: to explore. There are many unknowns that we still don't 32 00:01:52,880 --> 00:01:56,240 Speaker 1: know anything about about, the big questions that are unanswered, 33 00:01:56,320 --> 00:02:00,200 Speaker 1: and a lot of new stuff out there particle those 34 00:02:00,240 --> 00:02:04,400 Speaker 1: planets and galaxies and tiny little fluctuations that we have 35 00:02:04,560 --> 00:02:07,000 Speaker 1: yet to explore. Oh you bet. On this podcast, we 36 00:02:07,040 --> 00:02:09,560 Speaker 1: think that we are at the beginning of our discovery 37 00:02:09,600 --> 00:02:11,919 Speaker 1: of the nature of the universe. We think that most 38 00:02:11,960 --> 00:02:14,480 Speaker 1: of the road, most of the big ideas about the 39 00:02:14,480 --> 00:02:17,360 Speaker 1: way the universe works, are in the future, and we 40 00:02:17,520 --> 00:02:19,760 Speaker 1: just hope to stick around and be here when some 41 00:02:19,840 --> 00:02:22,240 Speaker 1: of those big ideas are revealed, so we get to 42 00:02:22,280 --> 00:02:26,200 Speaker 1: figure out how the universe actually works. Yeah, because there 43 00:02:26,240 --> 00:02:28,799 Speaker 1: are people working on this. They're called physicists, and they're 44 00:02:28,840 --> 00:02:31,520 Speaker 1: trying to every day to figure out what we're all 45 00:02:31,560 --> 00:02:34,040 Speaker 1: made of and how it all works. And recently there 46 00:02:34,040 --> 00:02:36,440 Speaker 1: has been some pretty exciting results coming out of the 47 00:02:36,440 --> 00:02:39,200 Speaker 1: physics community. That's right. There was a big result announced 48 00:02:39,200 --> 00:02:43,000 Speaker 1: at CERTAIN just last week with a surprising value, so 49 00:02:43,040 --> 00:02:45,280 Speaker 1: I got people kind of excited. Yeah, it seems to 50 00:02:45,280 --> 00:02:47,480 Speaker 1: be a lot of interesting discoveries coming out of physics 51 00:02:47,520 --> 00:02:50,080 Speaker 1: these days. And these are from the folks at CERTAIN, 52 00:02:50,080 --> 00:02:52,240 Speaker 1: which are the ones who discovered the Higgs boson, and 53 00:02:52,280 --> 00:02:54,880 Speaker 1: you who are partly your employers, right, Daniel, that's right. 54 00:02:54,880 --> 00:02:57,280 Speaker 1: I knew my research at CERTAIN. They don't pay my 55 00:02:57,360 --> 00:03:00,560 Speaker 1: salary at all, but I do use their collider smash 56 00:03:00,600 --> 00:03:03,520 Speaker 1: particle together and try to figure out what the smallest 57 00:03:03,600 --> 00:03:06,920 Speaker 1: thing is. But CERN is host to lots of different 58 00:03:07,000 --> 00:03:09,440 Speaker 1: kinds of experiments the kind that I work on smash 59 00:03:09,480 --> 00:03:12,080 Speaker 1: two protons together and like look for new heavy particles. 60 00:03:12,120 --> 00:03:14,560 Speaker 1: Today we'll be hearing about a different kind of experiment 61 00:03:14,639 --> 00:03:17,920 Speaker 1: at CERN using the same accelerator. Yeah, it may involve 62 00:03:18,000 --> 00:03:20,480 Speaker 1: maybe a new particle. It may involve a new particle. 63 00:03:20,560 --> 00:03:23,440 Speaker 1: You know. The fever dream of CERN is to discover 64 00:03:23,520 --> 00:03:25,880 Speaker 1: all sorts of new particles to crack open some of 65 00:03:25,880 --> 00:03:28,680 Speaker 1: the big questions about particle physics. You know, we have 66 00:03:28,840 --> 00:03:30,840 Speaker 1: like drilled down into the center of the adom and 67 00:03:30,919 --> 00:03:33,800 Speaker 1: revealed that protons and neutrons are made of quarks and 68 00:03:33,840 --> 00:03:36,200 Speaker 1: we have electrons whizzing around them. But there are so 69 00:03:36,240 --> 00:03:39,560 Speaker 1: many open questions about these particles. There's so many particles 70 00:03:39,600 --> 00:03:41,920 Speaker 1: we don't understand, and we don't understand why we have 71 00:03:42,040 --> 00:03:44,120 Speaker 1: the number we do and why they do the things 72 00:03:44,160 --> 00:03:45,680 Speaker 1: we do, and we feel like we're sort of in 73 00:03:45,680 --> 00:03:47,920 Speaker 1: the dark ages of particle physics where people will look 74 00:03:47,960 --> 00:03:50,040 Speaker 1: back in a hundred years and think, oh my gosh, 75 00:03:50,040 --> 00:03:53,040 Speaker 1: it was so obvious what was going on. But here 76 00:03:53,080 --> 00:03:55,480 Speaker 1: we are today sort of clueless on the forefront of 77 00:03:55,560 --> 00:03:58,560 Speaker 1: human ignorance, not really knowing how to make sense of it. 78 00:03:58,640 --> 00:04:00,360 Speaker 1: So the goal at certain is to find a bunch 79 00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:02,600 Speaker 1: of new particles to sort of fill in the gaps 80 00:04:02,720 --> 00:04:04,560 Speaker 1: and give us the bigger picture so we can get 81 00:04:04,600 --> 00:04:07,280 Speaker 1: a sense for like what's going on. Yeah, and today's 82 00:04:07,360 --> 00:04:10,520 Speaker 1: discovery that we're going to talk about involves penguins somehow, 83 00:04:11,200 --> 00:04:13,840 Speaker 1: And just to be clear to our listeners, Daniel, it 84 00:04:13,920 --> 00:04:16,760 Speaker 1: didn't smash any or crack open any penguins right in 85 00:04:16,760 --> 00:04:19,479 Speaker 1: this experiment. No penguins were harmed in the making of 86 00:04:19,520 --> 00:04:23,360 Speaker 1: this podcast, episode four of the experiment it describes, absolutely not. 87 00:04:23,520 --> 00:04:25,840 Speaker 1: We love penguins. In fact, that's why we name this 88 00:04:25,920 --> 00:04:28,680 Speaker 1: particular bit of physics after penguins, because they are just 89 00:04:28,720 --> 00:04:30,680 Speaker 1: so adorable so to be on the podcast, we'll be 90 00:04:30,720 --> 00:04:40,880 Speaker 1: asking the question, didcern just discover a new particle using penguins? 91 00:04:41,200 --> 00:04:45,000 Speaker 1: I'm picturing Daniel, penguins wearing white lap coats standing around 92 00:04:45,040 --> 00:04:49,760 Speaker 1: some giant machine, pressing buttons, checking clipboards. Am I right, Well, 93 00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:52,480 Speaker 1: I'm not surprised. That does sound like a cartoonists view 94 00:04:52,680 --> 00:04:55,520 Speaker 1: of the penguin particle collider. That sounds like a far 95 00:04:55,640 --> 00:04:57,919 Speaker 1: side strip. No, not at all. The way it involves 96 00:04:57,920 --> 00:05:01,080 Speaker 1: penguins is really just fanciful. You know, when we talk 97 00:05:01,120 --> 00:05:03,800 Speaker 1: about how particles interact with each other, we draw these 98 00:05:03,839 --> 00:05:06,920 Speaker 1: little diagrams that have lines, and the lines connect where 99 00:05:06,920 --> 00:05:09,760 Speaker 1: the particles interact, and they diverge when the particles go 100 00:05:09,839 --> 00:05:12,440 Speaker 1: in different directions. And you can make these diagrams simple 101 00:05:12,640 --> 00:05:15,240 Speaker 1: for a simple interaction, or complicated for like lots of 102 00:05:15,240 --> 00:05:18,400 Speaker 1: particles interacting. So you have these abstract sort of diagrams 103 00:05:18,400 --> 00:05:21,040 Speaker 1: to represent something physical, and you can look at them 104 00:05:21,040 --> 00:05:23,040 Speaker 1: and sort of like see something in them. There's sort 105 00:05:23,040 --> 00:05:25,039 Speaker 1: of like a Roschach test, you know, look at this 106 00:05:25,160 --> 00:05:27,719 Speaker 1: squally lines and tell me what you see. So there's 107 00:05:27,720 --> 00:05:30,600 Speaker 1: one particular sort of famous diagram which one theorist at 108 00:05:30,600 --> 00:05:33,600 Speaker 1: one point called a penguin diagram because to him it 109 00:05:33,720 --> 00:05:36,080 Speaker 1: sort of looked like a penguin. Yeah, I wish we 110 00:05:36,080 --> 00:05:39,560 Speaker 1: could somehow show this image to our listeners over this podcast, 111 00:05:39,600 --> 00:05:41,760 Speaker 1: because I can sort of see it. Maybe it looks 112 00:05:41,760 --> 00:05:44,480 Speaker 1: sort of like a square with a little round bottom 113 00:05:44,640 --> 00:05:47,320 Speaker 1: and two little feet. Maybe is that kind of what 114 00:05:47,360 --> 00:05:49,120 Speaker 1: they were thinking about? Oh? I think those feet are 115 00:05:49,120 --> 00:05:50,760 Speaker 1: supposed to be the beak. I think that's supposed to 116 00:05:50,800 --> 00:05:55,080 Speaker 1: be the face. So wait what, No, those are the 117 00:05:55,120 --> 00:05:58,400 Speaker 1: feet penguin. Where's the head then, well, it's a headless 118 00:05:58,680 --> 00:06:01,760 Speaker 1: because you cracked it open and your experiment. How's the 119 00:06:01,800 --> 00:06:04,039 Speaker 1: headless penguin eat raw fish? Then I don't want to 120 00:06:04,040 --> 00:06:06,000 Speaker 1: know where the fish goes. I don't know. You told 121 00:06:06,000 --> 00:06:08,280 Speaker 1: me you were the mad scientists here. I'm just podcasting 122 00:06:08,279 --> 00:06:10,040 Speaker 1: about it. I didn't do this experiment. I have no 123 00:06:10,120 --> 00:06:14,159 Speaker 1: responsibility for any miss. You only work in the same place, Daniel, 124 00:06:14,320 --> 00:06:17,240 Speaker 1: and eat lunch with the same physicists, and you know, 125 00:06:17,360 --> 00:06:20,760 Speaker 1: get paid to the same union feast. They do have 126 00:06:20,800 --> 00:06:23,719 Speaker 1: a suspicious amount of sushi, that's true. Maybe they're feeding 127 00:06:23,720 --> 00:06:26,360 Speaker 1: it to the penguins and those chicken wings on Chicken 128 00:06:26,360 --> 00:06:30,360 Speaker 1: Wings night. Maybe they're not chicken Oh my god. But yeah, 129 00:06:30,360 --> 00:06:32,760 Speaker 1: this is the news that came out recently, and several 130 00:06:32,839 --> 00:06:36,560 Speaker 1: listeners sent in the question asking us to explain it 131 00:06:36,600 --> 00:06:39,200 Speaker 1: and to talk about what happened and what did they discover. Yes, 132 00:06:39,240 --> 00:06:42,279 Speaker 1: certain does a good job of publicizing their discoveries, and 133 00:06:42,320 --> 00:06:43,800 Speaker 1: there's a lot of pressure leases and a lot of 134 00:06:43,800 --> 00:06:46,480 Speaker 1: coverage and a lot of articles quoting physicist saying this 135 00:06:46,600 --> 00:06:49,080 Speaker 1: is really important. And so a bunch of our listeners 136 00:06:49,080 --> 00:06:51,080 Speaker 1: wrote in and asked us to break it down for them. 137 00:06:51,240 --> 00:06:56,720 Speaker 1: We heard from Jonathan Tindell, Margie Foster, Shane Barnfield, Kendall Edwards, Heisman, 138 00:06:56,839 --> 00:07:00,719 Speaker 1: Essen pre End, Shoe pass One, and Vlodomir. So thanks 139 00:07:00,720 --> 00:07:02,800 Speaker 1: to everybody who wrote to us and asked us to 140 00:07:02,839 --> 00:07:05,560 Speaker 1: break down this big discovery. We're very excited to talk 141 00:07:05,560 --> 00:07:07,760 Speaker 1: about it. And if you hear something in the world 142 00:07:07,760 --> 00:07:10,120 Speaker 1: of physics that you don't understand, please write to us. 143 00:07:10,200 --> 00:07:12,560 Speaker 1: We will take it apart for you. Yeah, how to 144 00:07:12,600 --> 00:07:16,360 Speaker 1: penguins work? Or we will not take any penguins apart 145 00:07:16,440 --> 00:07:19,239 Speaker 1: for you. What's their magnetic polarity in the South Pole? 146 00:07:19,600 --> 00:07:22,440 Speaker 1: A spinning penguin? Alright, So these are some new results 147 00:07:22,480 --> 00:07:25,000 Speaker 1: coming out of CERN. And it involves also the Large 148 00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:27,840 Speaker 1: Hadron Collider, right, it does involve the Large Hadron Collider. 149 00:07:27,960 --> 00:07:30,920 Speaker 1: This is our big tool for discovering new physics because 150 00:07:30,920 --> 00:07:32,440 Speaker 1: it's the way that we can give a lot of 151 00:07:32,600 --> 00:07:35,040 Speaker 1: energy to these particles. And when the particles have a 152 00:07:35,040 --> 00:07:37,800 Speaker 1: lot of energy, that let us access other kinds of 153 00:07:37,840 --> 00:07:40,840 Speaker 1: particles that normally we can't see because there's not enough 154 00:07:40,920 --> 00:07:43,080 Speaker 1: energy around to make them. Remember that in the early 155 00:07:43,160 --> 00:07:45,720 Speaker 1: universe things were hot and dense. There was much more 156 00:07:45,840 --> 00:07:49,040 Speaker 1: energy sort of per area, per volume, and so a 157 00:07:49,040 --> 00:07:51,560 Speaker 1: lot of these particles probably existed back then. But these 158 00:07:51,640 --> 00:07:54,920 Speaker 1: days the universe is sort of cold and slow and separated, 159 00:07:55,200 --> 00:07:57,880 Speaker 1: and so to create these weird particles, to find them 160 00:07:57,920 --> 00:08:00,080 Speaker 1: to give us clues as to how to crack the 161 00:08:00,120 --> 00:08:03,520 Speaker 1: big mysteries of particle physics. We have to recreate those conditions. 162 00:08:03,760 --> 00:08:05,880 Speaker 1: We have to create a lot of energy density, So 163 00:08:05,880 --> 00:08:08,200 Speaker 1: we use the large hage On collider to smash protons 164 00:08:08,240 --> 00:08:10,840 Speaker 1: together to make that little blob of energy which can 165 00:08:10,880 --> 00:08:12,920 Speaker 1: give us a clue about what's going on. Yeah, because 166 00:08:12,960 --> 00:08:16,040 Speaker 1: from that blob of energy, basically anything that can come 167 00:08:16,040 --> 00:08:19,520 Speaker 1: out does come out eventually, right with some sort of probability, 168 00:08:19,720 --> 00:08:22,120 Speaker 1: Like from that blow of energy, other particles can come out, 169 00:08:22,160 --> 00:08:24,640 Speaker 1: and that sort of tells us what kinds of particles 170 00:08:24,680 --> 00:08:27,840 Speaker 1: the universe can make. Yeah, exactly. It's sort of amazing. 171 00:08:28,040 --> 00:08:30,080 Speaker 1: You don't have to know what you're going to make 172 00:08:30,400 --> 00:08:32,280 Speaker 1: before you turn on the collider. You just get to 173 00:08:32,320 --> 00:08:34,840 Speaker 1: see like everything that's possible, and so you just got 174 00:08:34,840 --> 00:08:37,080 Speaker 1: to sort of watch and eventually everything will pop out. 175 00:08:37,200 --> 00:08:40,040 Speaker 1: And the classic way to use the LC to discover 176 00:08:40,120 --> 00:08:42,680 Speaker 1: new particles is to do exactly that, to like make 177 00:08:42,840 --> 00:08:45,880 Speaker 1: some new particle and then see it turn into something else. 178 00:08:45,920 --> 00:08:48,000 Speaker 1: And that's what we did. For example, with the Higgs boson. 179 00:08:48,280 --> 00:08:50,280 Speaker 1: We have to crank up the energy of the particle 180 00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:53,240 Speaker 1: collider so there was enough energy to make Higgs bosons, 181 00:08:53,360 --> 00:08:55,280 Speaker 1: and then we could see them turn into other stuff, 182 00:08:55,320 --> 00:08:57,960 Speaker 1: and observe them in our detectors. That's sort of the 183 00:08:58,000 --> 00:09:00,680 Speaker 1: classic way. That's the direct way, like actually make it 184 00:09:00,720 --> 00:09:03,520 Speaker 1: in your colliders, like have it appear and be visible 185 00:09:03,559 --> 00:09:06,000 Speaker 1: to your detectors. But that's sort of difficult because then 186 00:09:06,040 --> 00:09:09,440 Speaker 1: you actually have to have enough energy to create these things. Yeah, 187 00:09:09,520 --> 00:09:11,960 Speaker 1: and so this new discovery uses sort of a different 188 00:09:12,000 --> 00:09:15,720 Speaker 1: way of discovering particles. Right, you're looking not at actually 189 00:09:15,760 --> 00:09:18,280 Speaker 1: making the particles you're looking for, but looking at their 190 00:09:18,320 --> 00:09:21,240 Speaker 1: effects on other particles. Yeah, we are limited by the 191 00:09:21,360 --> 00:09:24,240 Speaker 1: energy we can pour into the collider. And so for example, 192 00:09:24,280 --> 00:09:27,319 Speaker 1: if there's another particle that's just a little bit too 193 00:09:27,320 --> 00:09:29,800 Speaker 1: heavy for us to make it, then we can't make 194 00:09:29,840 --> 00:09:31,720 Speaker 1: it in the collider. It just doesn't appear when we 195 00:09:31,760 --> 00:09:35,439 Speaker 1: make those collisions. And so that really limits our ability 196 00:09:35,520 --> 00:09:38,080 Speaker 1: to find these things because it's not easy to crank 197 00:09:38,160 --> 00:09:40,240 Speaker 1: up the energy of the collider. To do that, you 198 00:09:40,280 --> 00:09:42,640 Speaker 1: need like a bigger ring, which means a bigger tunnel 199 00:09:42,760 --> 00:09:45,400 Speaker 1: or stronger magnets. All that stuff is expensive and very 200 00:09:45,440 --> 00:09:47,200 Speaker 1: hard to change. It's not like there's just like a 201 00:09:47,280 --> 00:09:49,520 Speaker 1: knob on the large change on collider. And I mean 202 00:09:49,520 --> 00:09:52,040 Speaker 1: we've already cranked this thing up to eleven. Right, doesn't 203 00:09:52,040 --> 00:09:54,320 Speaker 1: go any higher, So you need to build a new collider. 204 00:09:54,400 --> 00:09:57,200 Speaker 1: Have you tried then? I think there's a twelveth setting 205 00:09:57,200 --> 00:09:59,840 Speaker 1: on that knob, but people are just too afraid. Well, 206 00:09:59,840 --> 00:10:01,600 Speaker 1: then not gonna let me in the control room because 207 00:10:01,600 --> 00:10:04,240 Speaker 1: I love to twiddle knobs and press buttons, and so 208 00:10:04,320 --> 00:10:06,320 Speaker 1: I'd go crazy in there. You're like a penguin just 209 00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:09,520 Speaker 1: slipping all the buttons. I've had some bad fish for 210 00:10:09,600 --> 00:10:12,160 Speaker 1: lunch and and making some bad decisions. But there is 211 00:10:12,280 --> 00:10:14,720 Speaker 1: this other trick we can use that you just mentioned 212 00:10:14,760 --> 00:10:17,400 Speaker 1: to try to see hints from other particles. Because if 213 00:10:17,440 --> 00:10:20,680 Speaker 1: you create the right conditions, these other big, heavy particles 214 00:10:20,679 --> 00:10:23,600 Speaker 1: that you don't have enough energy to actually make, they 215 00:10:23,679 --> 00:10:27,680 Speaker 1: can still influence what's going on. They can like appear momentarily. 216 00:10:27,960 --> 00:10:30,559 Speaker 1: They can like pop out of the vacuum and nudge 217 00:10:30,600 --> 00:10:34,120 Speaker 1: some of the particles we can see and then disappear again. Yeah, 218 00:10:34,280 --> 00:10:36,880 Speaker 1: and so that tells you about that particle, right, You 219 00:10:36,880 --> 00:10:38,880 Speaker 1: see the effect of it, and so you can say, hey, 220 00:10:39,000 --> 00:10:41,439 Speaker 1: is that something either. Yeah, It's sort of like if 221 00:10:41,480 --> 00:10:43,880 Speaker 1: you go to the forest and look for unicorns. The 222 00:10:43,880 --> 00:10:46,280 Speaker 1: best thing to do is to like see a unicorn. Right, Okay, 223 00:10:46,280 --> 00:10:48,319 Speaker 1: you got a unicorn you're bringing home. Everybody believes in 224 00:10:48,360 --> 00:10:51,560 Speaker 1: your unicorn. But if instead, if you can't find unicorns 225 00:10:51,559 --> 00:10:53,679 Speaker 1: because they're too slippery or your canvas not good enough 226 00:10:53,679 --> 00:10:56,640 Speaker 1: for whatever, you might find evidence of unicorns. Maybe you 227 00:10:56,679 --> 00:10:58,960 Speaker 1: see their tracks, or you see how they're like, are 228 00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:02,480 Speaker 1: bothering the other horses or something. It's more indirect, but 229 00:11:02,600 --> 00:11:06,240 Speaker 1: you can convince yourselves that those unicorns exist without actually 230 00:11:06,280 --> 00:11:08,360 Speaker 1: seeing one. And that's what we're sort of doing here 231 00:11:08,559 --> 00:11:11,840 Speaker 1: with these really heavy particles. We can't actually make them, 232 00:11:11,920 --> 00:11:13,840 Speaker 1: but we hope this sort of appear in these fluctuations 233 00:11:13,840 --> 00:11:16,440 Speaker 1: and affect the particles that we can see. And if 234 00:11:16,480 --> 00:11:20,480 Speaker 1: we measure those effects really precisely, then we can deduce that, oh, 235 00:11:20,559 --> 00:11:22,720 Speaker 1: there is something weird and new and heavy there. But 236 00:11:22,800 --> 00:11:26,240 Speaker 1: how could you tell Daniel how different unicorns trucks are 237 00:11:26,320 --> 00:11:31,080 Speaker 1: from a regular horse, because the only difference is the horn. Well, 238 00:11:31,120 --> 00:11:33,960 Speaker 1: you know, sometimes a unicorn scratches a tree or something. 239 00:11:34,080 --> 00:11:36,240 Speaker 1: You've got to be clever, you know, you could look 240 00:11:36,280 --> 00:11:40,280 Speaker 1: for rainbow poop. I hear that tell tale sign of unicorns, Yeah, exactly. 241 00:11:40,400 --> 00:11:43,439 Speaker 1: I heard that sometimes penguins ride unicorns also, so you 242 00:11:43,480 --> 00:11:45,280 Speaker 1: could just like look for the penguins or you know, 243 00:11:45,400 --> 00:11:48,800 Speaker 1: track the fish. You know they're called narwhals, But that's 244 00:11:48,840 --> 00:11:51,240 Speaker 1: exactly it. It takes an extra cleverness. You have to 245 00:11:51,320 --> 00:11:55,080 Speaker 1: like find a way that these new particles might affect 246 00:11:55,080 --> 00:11:58,120 Speaker 1: the particles you are looking at in a unique way, 247 00:11:58,400 --> 00:12:00,800 Speaker 1: in a way that you can't explain the other way. 248 00:12:01,160 --> 00:12:03,400 Speaker 1: And then you have to make really really precise measurements 249 00:12:03,440 --> 00:12:05,960 Speaker 1: of the particles that you're studying. And so because at 250 00:12:06,000 --> 00:12:08,960 Speaker 1: the LHC, we haven't found any new particles. You know, 251 00:12:09,000 --> 00:12:11,000 Speaker 1: we were hoping when we turn this thing on, find 252 00:12:11,000 --> 00:12:13,240 Speaker 1: the Higgs boson and then find like fifty five or 253 00:12:13,360 --> 00:12:16,240 Speaker 1: thousand or whatever new particles that we could study. We 254 00:12:16,320 --> 00:12:19,360 Speaker 1: haven't found those yet. It's been a bit disappointing, and 255 00:12:19,400 --> 00:12:22,480 Speaker 1: so our backup plan sort of is to find hints 256 00:12:22,559 --> 00:12:25,200 Speaker 1: of these new particles to reassure us that they are there, 257 00:12:25,480 --> 00:12:29,000 Speaker 1: even if they're above our energy range. I see, because somehow, 258 00:12:29,040 --> 00:12:32,920 Speaker 1: even if you're not creating the necessary amount of energy, 259 00:12:32,960 --> 00:12:36,839 Speaker 1: they could still somehow pop up or still somehow kind 260 00:12:36,840 --> 00:12:39,640 Speaker 1: of affect the probabilities of the other particles. What sort 261 00:12:39,679 --> 00:12:41,640 Speaker 1: of effect are we talking about? Well, we're talking about 262 00:12:41,640 --> 00:12:44,720 Speaker 1: how particles decay. So take a particle, for example, like 263 00:12:44,880 --> 00:12:48,240 Speaker 1: a B Mason, which is a combination of two weird corks. 264 00:12:48,280 --> 00:12:50,600 Speaker 1: These particles decay and when they decay, they do it 265 00:12:50,640 --> 00:12:54,720 Speaker 1: by interacting with W bosons and Z bosons and other particles. 266 00:12:54,720 --> 00:12:56,800 Speaker 1: So you draw a lot of these lines that describe 267 00:12:56,840 --> 00:12:59,800 Speaker 1: how the particles decay. But if there are other ways 268 00:12:59,800 --> 00:13:02,200 Speaker 1: for the decay, if they can decay by interacting with 269 00:13:02,240 --> 00:13:05,960 Speaker 1: these new weird heavy particles, then that will change how 270 00:13:06,000 --> 00:13:08,600 Speaker 1: often they decay and what they decay into. So if 271 00:13:08,640 --> 00:13:10,840 Speaker 1: you take, for example, these be masons and you measure 272 00:13:10,880 --> 00:13:14,240 Speaker 1: really carefully what they turn into sometimes this, sometimes that's 273 00:13:14,280 --> 00:13:16,200 Speaker 1: sometimes the other thing, and you compare that to what 274 00:13:16,320 --> 00:13:19,480 Speaker 1: you predict from your calculations. If there were no other 275 00:13:19,559 --> 00:13:22,600 Speaker 1: new heavy particles, then maybe you can see some discrepancies. 276 00:13:22,800 --> 00:13:25,000 Speaker 1: I see all this time since the Higgs boson, you've 277 00:13:25,040 --> 00:13:29,360 Speaker 1: been running the LC smashing particles hopefully not birds, and 278 00:13:29,480 --> 00:13:31,360 Speaker 1: just kind of scene of things. Check out, you know, 279 00:13:31,400 --> 00:13:34,520 Speaker 1: if they match what your theory says that you should see. Yeah, 280 00:13:34,559 --> 00:13:36,040 Speaker 1: that's a good way to put it. One way to 281 00:13:36,080 --> 00:13:38,360 Speaker 1: find new particles is to like actually see them. The 282 00:13:38,400 --> 00:13:41,640 Speaker 1: other ways to look for little discrepancies, like is there 283 00:13:41,679 --> 00:13:44,400 Speaker 1: anything weird in the data at all? Anything we don't 284 00:13:44,480 --> 00:13:47,640 Speaker 1: understand because we can do these careful comparisons, and anything 285 00:13:47,679 --> 00:13:50,880 Speaker 1: that doesn't match up indicates that there's something new, there's 286 00:13:50,920 --> 00:13:54,880 Speaker 1: something we didn't expect, something exists in reality that doesn't 287 00:13:54,920 --> 00:13:57,640 Speaker 1: exist in our calculations, which means we need to change 288 00:13:57,640 --> 00:13:59,840 Speaker 1: our calculations by like adding a new particle or a 289 00:13:59,840 --> 00:14:02,679 Speaker 1: new force or you know, a new tiny little bird 290 00:14:02,800 --> 00:14:05,560 Speaker 1: that's affecting the experiments. All right, and apparently you have 291 00:14:05,679 --> 00:14:09,080 Speaker 1: found some sort of weird anomaly in the data, right, Yeah. 292 00:14:09,160 --> 00:14:12,240 Speaker 1: Until recently, there were some hints there were some things 293 00:14:12,280 --> 00:14:15,360 Speaker 1: that were sort of tantalizing but not really significant enough 294 00:14:15,400 --> 00:14:18,240 Speaker 1: to make anybody believe they meant anything. We were looking 295 00:14:18,240 --> 00:14:21,080 Speaker 1: at the decay rates of these b masons and they 296 00:14:21,080 --> 00:14:23,880 Speaker 1: didn't look quite right, and we thought, maybe there are 297 00:14:23,880 --> 00:14:26,920 Speaker 1: some new particles, but you need really precise measurements, and 298 00:14:27,240 --> 00:14:29,760 Speaker 1: you know, we saw things decaying in one way and 299 00:14:29,880 --> 00:14:32,040 Speaker 1: they were expected to decay another way, but they were 300 00:14:32,120 --> 00:14:34,680 Speaker 1: kind of close also, and we spent a lot of 301 00:14:34,680 --> 00:14:37,400 Speaker 1: time assessing the uncertainties on these things to see like 302 00:14:37,600 --> 00:14:40,640 Speaker 1: do they overlap or not. And so there were some hints, 303 00:14:40,640 --> 00:14:43,200 Speaker 1: but they weren't really conclusive, and so people thought of 304 00:14:43,200 --> 00:14:46,000 Speaker 1: a more precise way, a more powerful way to test 305 00:14:46,080 --> 00:14:48,680 Speaker 1: these things. And that's the result that was released just 306 00:14:48,760 --> 00:14:51,200 Speaker 1: last week. It's pretty significant, you think it. Is it 307 00:14:51,360 --> 00:14:53,960 Speaker 1: tantalizing result or is it like a conclusive, wow, we 308 00:14:54,000 --> 00:14:57,600 Speaker 1: found something results. It's decidedly right in the middle or 309 00:14:57,680 --> 00:15:01,440 Speaker 1: right it's in a superposition of exciting and boring at 310 00:15:01,440 --> 00:15:04,080 Speaker 1: the same time. Yeah, exactly. We will look back later 311 00:15:04,280 --> 00:15:06,560 Speaker 1: and know whether this was the first hint of a 312 00:15:06,640 --> 00:15:10,280 Speaker 1: crazy new discovery that revolutionized physics, or it's just another 313 00:15:10,320 --> 00:15:12,360 Speaker 1: blip that turned out to be nothing. We will know 314 00:15:12,400 --> 00:15:14,680 Speaker 1: in the future. Right now, we don't know, but we 315 00:15:14,720 --> 00:15:17,480 Speaker 1: can have fun speculating. Right it could be the unicorn, 316 00:15:17,560 --> 00:15:20,200 Speaker 1: or it could just be a donkey maybe wandering through 317 00:15:20,240 --> 00:15:22,680 Speaker 1: the forest. Yeah, or like fifteen penguins in a trench coat. 318 00:15:22,720 --> 00:15:25,200 Speaker 1: You know, any of those would be exciting, especially to 319 00:15:25,280 --> 00:15:28,120 Speaker 1: the donkey. All right, well, let's get into what they 320 00:15:28,280 --> 00:15:32,360 Speaker 1: actually found and measured and discovered and what it all means. 321 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:47,400 Speaker 1: But first let's take a quick break. All right, we're 322 00:15:47,440 --> 00:15:50,800 Speaker 1: talking about whether or not sar and found a new particle. 323 00:15:51,000 --> 00:15:53,200 Speaker 1: Is it a new particle or a new force? Daniel, Well, 324 00:15:53,200 --> 00:15:55,080 Speaker 1: we don't know. I don't know. It's a new thing. 325 00:15:55,320 --> 00:15:57,840 Speaker 1: It's a new thing. It's a new thing. To not 326 00:15:57,920 --> 00:16:00,360 Speaker 1: say what the thing is. It might be any We 327 00:16:00,480 --> 00:16:03,400 Speaker 1: just don't know. One of the disadvantages of discovering something 328 00:16:03,480 --> 00:16:06,120 Speaker 1: this way is that you don't really know what's causing it. 329 00:16:06,360 --> 00:16:09,120 Speaker 1: You see something weird, it might be evidence that there's 330 00:16:09,160 --> 00:16:12,120 Speaker 1: something new, but you don't have as specific a handle 331 00:16:12,160 --> 00:16:15,040 Speaker 1: on it as if you actually made the thing directly 332 00:16:15,440 --> 00:16:17,280 Speaker 1: and could see it. De kay, all right, we'll step 333 00:16:17,360 --> 00:16:19,360 Speaker 1: us through. What did they actually find and what did 334 00:16:19,400 --> 00:16:22,080 Speaker 1: they measure? So this comes from an awesome experiment. It's 335 00:16:22,080 --> 00:16:25,200 Speaker 1: called LHC B and it's called lc BE because it 336 00:16:25,280 --> 00:16:29,040 Speaker 1: runs at the LHC and involves mostly these B corks. Now, 337 00:16:29,120 --> 00:16:32,160 Speaker 1: BE corks are the pair of top corks. Right, So 338 00:16:32,200 --> 00:16:34,480 Speaker 1: we have six corks in the standard model. There's the 339 00:16:34,560 --> 00:16:36,760 Speaker 1: up and the down. These are the ones that are 340 00:16:36,800 --> 00:16:38,880 Speaker 1: familiar to you because they make you up there in 341 00:16:38,880 --> 00:16:41,960 Speaker 1: the protons and neutrons. And there's a couple of weirder corks, 342 00:16:42,120 --> 00:16:44,760 Speaker 1: the charm and the strange cork, which are a little 343 00:16:44,800 --> 00:16:47,160 Speaker 1: bit heavier and it can make funny little particles. And 344 00:16:47,200 --> 00:16:50,280 Speaker 1: then the last generation, the last pairing are the bottom 345 00:16:50,360 --> 00:16:54,320 Speaker 1: cork and the top cork. Top cork only discovered the 346 00:16:54,480 --> 00:16:56,720 Speaker 1: Fermi lab in the bottom cork discovered in the seventies. 347 00:16:56,760 --> 00:16:59,760 Speaker 1: But as usual, there's a controversy about what the call 348 00:17:00,040 --> 00:17:02,920 Speaker 1: this particle. The bottom cork. Half of the community calls 349 00:17:02,960 --> 00:17:05,200 Speaker 1: it the bottom cork as a member of the pair 350 00:17:05,359 --> 00:17:07,880 Speaker 1: top and bottom. The other half of the community calls 351 00:17:07,920 --> 00:17:10,959 Speaker 1: it the beauty cork because they call them the truth 352 00:17:11,080 --> 00:17:14,200 Speaker 1: and the beauty corks. Wait, there's a controversy in the 353 00:17:14,200 --> 00:17:16,760 Speaker 1: physics community about what to name these particles, and it's 354 00:17:16,760 --> 00:17:18,680 Speaker 1: been going on for twenty five years. Is that what 355 00:17:18,720 --> 00:17:20,399 Speaker 1: you're saying? Yeah, they just don't know how to make 356 00:17:20,440 --> 00:17:23,119 Speaker 1: these decisions. There are some people who measure these things 357 00:17:23,160 --> 00:17:25,720 Speaker 1: being produced and they call them bottoms, and the other community, 358 00:17:25,920 --> 00:17:28,440 Speaker 1: the one studying how these things decay, tend to call 359 00:17:28,520 --> 00:17:31,280 Speaker 1: them beauty corks. And those two are sort of different 360 00:17:31,280 --> 00:17:33,359 Speaker 1: communities and they don't get together that often, and so 361 00:17:33,400 --> 00:17:35,600 Speaker 1: they've just sort of like gone their own ways calling 362 00:17:35,680 --> 00:17:38,040 Speaker 1: the same particle with two different names. Is it like 363 00:17:38,040 --> 00:17:41,520 Speaker 1: a Europe versus U s thing. No, not even I 364 00:17:41,520 --> 00:17:45,440 Speaker 1: think maybe there's more Europeans saying beauty and more Americans 365 00:17:45,440 --> 00:17:48,679 Speaker 1: saying bottom. But there's definitely some Americans I've heard use 366 00:17:48,720 --> 00:17:51,440 Speaker 1: beauty and some Europeans use bottom. You just call them 367 00:17:51,480 --> 00:17:54,399 Speaker 1: beautiful bottoms. Why not. I like big corks, and I 368 00:17:54,440 --> 00:17:58,800 Speaker 1: cannot lie you go, you can be totally non pc 369 00:17:59,000 --> 00:18:01,800 Speaker 1: about the part goes in the standard model. Yeah, And 370 00:18:01,880 --> 00:18:05,320 Speaker 1: so l ah c B is an experiment that's dedicated 371 00:18:05,359 --> 00:18:08,080 Speaker 1: to studying this kind of cork, the bottom cork, the 372 00:18:08,080 --> 00:18:10,280 Speaker 1: be corry, the beauty cork, whatever you wanna call it. 373 00:18:10,359 --> 00:18:13,000 Speaker 1: And it works kind of differently from the other experiments. 374 00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:15,400 Speaker 1: The one that I work on Atlas, for example, it's 375 00:18:15,400 --> 00:18:17,879 Speaker 1: sort of like a big cylinder. It surrounds the collision 376 00:18:17,920 --> 00:18:20,080 Speaker 1: point and takes a picture of everything and that flies 377 00:18:20,119 --> 00:18:22,879 Speaker 1: out because we're hoping to make something at that collision 378 00:18:23,040 --> 00:18:25,520 Speaker 1: and then see what it turns into. This experiment is 379 00:18:25,520 --> 00:18:27,639 Speaker 1: a little bit different. There's still a collision point, is 380 00:18:27,640 --> 00:18:30,560 Speaker 1: still colliding protons on protons. They're not interested in what 381 00:18:30,600 --> 00:18:33,320 Speaker 1: happens in the actual collision. They're interested in what happens 382 00:18:33,359 --> 00:18:36,000 Speaker 1: to the stuff that flies out. Because when you have 383 00:18:36,080 --> 00:18:38,720 Speaker 1: these protons colliding, you also get like a huge shower 384 00:18:38,880 --> 00:18:41,399 Speaker 1: just sort of like junk particles out the front, and 385 00:18:41,440 --> 00:18:44,040 Speaker 1: because there's a lot of energy coming in both directions 386 00:18:44,040 --> 00:18:45,720 Speaker 1: and most of it just sort of like goes down 387 00:18:45,800 --> 00:18:48,199 Speaker 1: the beam pipe. So this experiment is different because it 388 00:18:48,200 --> 00:18:50,919 Speaker 1: doesn't surround the whole collision point with detectors. It just 389 00:18:51,000 --> 00:18:53,720 Speaker 1: captures some of that forward stuff and looks for these 390 00:18:53,760 --> 00:18:56,720 Speaker 1: bottom corks and watch them turn into other stuff, watch 391 00:18:56,800 --> 00:19:00,480 Speaker 1: them interact, watch them, kay, watch them do their thing. Well, 392 00:19:00,480 --> 00:19:02,400 Speaker 1: but this one is different, you're saying, Yeah, So that's 393 00:19:02,400 --> 00:19:04,600 Speaker 1: how this one is different. At LEAs and cms like 394 00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:06,720 Speaker 1: surround the collision point, this one just sort of like 395 00:19:06,800 --> 00:19:09,520 Speaker 1: forward stuff, like the stuff that spews out towards the 396 00:19:09,520 --> 00:19:11,879 Speaker 1: beam pipe. It takes a picture of that, and so 397 00:19:11,960 --> 00:19:15,399 Speaker 1: it's organized kind of differently. But the basics principles still applied. 398 00:19:15,400 --> 00:19:17,719 Speaker 1: They can still find the tracks of particles, they can 399 00:19:17,720 --> 00:19:20,639 Speaker 1: still measure their energies. But what they're looking for is 400 00:19:20,640 --> 00:19:22,639 Speaker 1: not like did we make a new Higgs boson or 401 00:19:22,680 --> 00:19:24,640 Speaker 1: do we make a new heavy particle, But they're looking 402 00:19:24,680 --> 00:19:28,040 Speaker 1: to identify particles that have be corks in them and 403 00:19:28,080 --> 00:19:31,679 Speaker 1: watch those particles decay. But you're still watching the collisions though, right. 404 00:19:31,880 --> 00:19:34,280 Speaker 1: These things are created from the collisions, but they're sort 405 00:19:34,320 --> 00:19:36,879 Speaker 1: of like secondary products of the collisions rather than the 406 00:19:36,920 --> 00:19:39,720 Speaker 1: primary products. You don't really care what created these be 407 00:19:39,880 --> 00:19:43,000 Speaker 1: masons or these be corks. You're just interested in watching 408 00:19:43,000 --> 00:19:45,480 Speaker 1: them decay. So they're made in the collider, but then 409 00:19:45,520 --> 00:19:47,960 Speaker 1: you sort of catch them where you channel them and 410 00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:50,760 Speaker 1: then you measure them. Yeah, exactly, So we're interested in 411 00:19:50,800 --> 00:19:54,240 Speaker 1: this case in this particle called a B plus mason. 412 00:19:54,640 --> 00:19:57,600 Speaker 1: Remember that quirks can combine in all sorts of ways, 413 00:19:57,720 --> 00:20:00,200 Speaker 1: but they have these weird things called color, sort of 414 00:20:00,200 --> 00:20:02,879 Speaker 1: the analogy of electric charge for the strong force, the 415 00:20:02,960 --> 00:20:05,320 Speaker 1: strong nuclear force. If you want to have a particle 416 00:20:05,359 --> 00:20:08,560 Speaker 1: that doesn't have an overall strong nuclear charge, we call 417 00:20:08,640 --> 00:20:11,400 Speaker 1: that without color, then you need to have the colors balance. 418 00:20:11,800 --> 00:20:13,879 Speaker 1: So you can do that by having one cork and 419 00:20:13,960 --> 00:20:16,359 Speaker 1: an anti cork, where the cork is like red and 420 00:20:16,400 --> 00:20:19,600 Speaker 1: anti red, or green and anti green. You can also 421 00:20:19,680 --> 00:20:22,040 Speaker 1: do it by making triplets of these particles, like a 422 00:20:22,040 --> 00:20:25,760 Speaker 1: proton or a neutron has three quarks inside. This particle 423 00:20:25,800 --> 00:20:29,320 Speaker 1: we're discussing is a B plus mason. It has two quarks, 424 00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:31,720 Speaker 1: So you start with an up cork. I mean, you 425 00:20:31,760 --> 00:20:34,639 Speaker 1: have an anti beauty cork. I don't know what that is, 426 00:20:34,680 --> 00:20:37,160 Speaker 1: like an ugly cork combined to make this particle called 427 00:20:37,200 --> 00:20:40,040 Speaker 1: a B plus mason. So it's got two corks inside 428 00:20:40,040 --> 00:20:42,639 Speaker 1: of it. So you're making pairs of corks, and you 429 00:20:42,720 --> 00:20:45,639 Speaker 1: call those B plus masons because they're a different combination 430 00:20:45,680 --> 00:20:48,240 Speaker 1: of corks. And then you study what happens to those. Yeah, 431 00:20:48,400 --> 00:20:50,840 Speaker 1: when you have the original collision from the proton, all 432 00:20:50,840 --> 00:20:54,320 Speaker 1: these corks flyouts crazy energy, and the corks gathered together 433 00:20:54,600 --> 00:20:56,800 Speaker 1: into particles because they don't like to be by themselves. 434 00:20:56,920 --> 00:20:58,400 Speaker 1: If you're interested in that, we have a whole fun 435 00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:01,919 Speaker 1: podcast episode about why quarks can't be alone because the 436 00:21:01,920 --> 00:21:04,679 Speaker 1: strong nuclear charge is so weird. But yeah, you're right. 437 00:21:04,760 --> 00:21:06,840 Speaker 1: We have these B plus masons that are made, and 438 00:21:06,880 --> 00:21:09,239 Speaker 1: then we watch and see what happens. And so in 439 00:21:09,280 --> 00:21:13,160 Speaker 1: particular here they're watching to see if these particles decay 440 00:21:13,200 --> 00:21:16,439 Speaker 1: into a kon and then two muans or a kon 441 00:21:16,760 --> 00:21:20,240 Speaker 1: and two electrons. And we think that that should happened 442 00:21:20,320 --> 00:21:23,639 Speaker 1: exactly the same rate that the universe shouldn't perform. U 443 00:21:23,680 --> 00:21:26,040 Speaker 1: wants two electrons. That the rate at which these two 444 00:21:26,040 --> 00:21:29,399 Speaker 1: things happen should be exactly equal because electrons have the 445 00:21:29,480 --> 00:21:32,840 Speaker 1: same I don't know energy as a mun or why 446 00:21:32,840 --> 00:21:35,359 Speaker 1: would the universe be exactly the same for both. We 447 00:21:35,400 --> 00:21:37,560 Speaker 1: don't know, and we don't even know why the muon exists. 448 00:21:37,680 --> 00:21:40,560 Speaker 1: But the ELECTRONO muan are very very similar. They're almost 449 00:21:40,600 --> 00:21:43,719 Speaker 1: exactly the same particle, they have the same electric charge, 450 00:21:43,760 --> 00:21:46,200 Speaker 1: they interact with the weak force the same way. They're 451 00:21:46,200 --> 00:21:49,440 Speaker 1: basically cousins. Right then, Muan is basically just a slightly 452 00:21:49,480 --> 00:21:53,240 Speaker 1: heavier version of the electron. And in every other experiment 453 00:21:53,280 --> 00:21:57,119 Speaker 1: we see, the universe treats these leptons, the electron, the muan, 454 00:21:57,160 --> 00:22:00,800 Speaker 1: and the taw all the same. For example, the z boson, 455 00:22:00,880 --> 00:22:03,520 Speaker 1: which is a very important particle, decays into these things 456 00:22:03,520 --> 00:22:06,400 Speaker 1: in the case into each almost exactly the same rate. 457 00:22:06,880 --> 00:22:10,000 Speaker 1: So we don't know why, but we have observed everywhere 458 00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:13,359 Speaker 1: else in particle physics that these things are treated universally, 459 00:22:13,600 --> 00:22:15,760 Speaker 1: that everywhere you're gonna have an electron, you can also 460 00:22:15,800 --> 00:22:18,359 Speaker 1: have a muan, and the same thing happens at the 461 00:22:18,400 --> 00:22:21,159 Speaker 1: same rate. And so it would be interesting and weird 462 00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:24,560 Speaker 1: in a surprise if this B plus Mason like to 463 00:22:24,600 --> 00:22:26,840 Speaker 1: dedicate the muans more often, or like to decay to 464 00:22:26,880 --> 00:22:30,359 Speaker 1: electrons more often. That would show a weird preference for 465 00:22:30,520 --> 00:22:32,639 Speaker 1: one kind of particle over the other, and maybe a 466 00:22:32,720 --> 00:22:35,359 Speaker 1: hint that something new is going on. Because the theory 467 00:22:35,440 --> 00:22:37,080 Speaker 1: says that they should be the same, like in the 468 00:22:37,119 --> 00:22:39,720 Speaker 1: math involved, that they should be exactly or at least 469 00:22:39,720 --> 00:22:42,080 Speaker 1: the math that you have says that you should see 470 00:22:42,080 --> 00:22:44,800 Speaker 1: the same results equally. Yes, the math that we have 471 00:22:44,920 --> 00:22:48,120 Speaker 1: says that should be almost exactly equal. And those listeners 472 00:22:48,160 --> 00:22:50,080 Speaker 1: who are really in the particle physics will know that 473 00:22:50,119 --> 00:22:52,800 Speaker 1: the ELECTRONO muant are not exactly the same, right. The 474 00:22:52,840 --> 00:22:55,840 Speaker 1: difference between them is the mass. The mulant is heavier 475 00:22:55,880 --> 00:22:58,560 Speaker 1: than the electron, and that does make some difference, but 476 00:22:58,640 --> 00:23:01,480 Speaker 1: they account for this in their measurements, and they know 477 00:23:01,560 --> 00:23:03,720 Speaker 1: how much the mass should affect the rate of which 478 00:23:03,720 --> 00:23:06,760 Speaker 1: this thing turns into mus and turns into electrons. And 479 00:23:06,840 --> 00:23:08,919 Speaker 1: what they're looking for is something more than that, a 480 00:23:08,960 --> 00:23:11,960 Speaker 1: bigger difference than that. So, yes, our calculations predict that 481 00:23:11,960 --> 00:23:15,080 Speaker 1: there should be a very very small, almost negligible difference 482 00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:17,920 Speaker 1: between the rate of decay to muans and two electrons. 483 00:23:18,040 --> 00:23:19,960 Speaker 1: And then we do the experiment and we measure very 484 00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:22,439 Speaker 1: carefully to see how often we see one versus the 485 00:23:22,480 --> 00:23:24,480 Speaker 1: other they see and you're checking to see if the 486 00:23:24,600 --> 00:23:27,240 Speaker 1: two are different by that small amount or if they're 487 00:23:27,240 --> 00:23:30,600 Speaker 1: different by more or less than what the theory predicts. Yeah, 488 00:23:30,840 --> 00:23:32,840 Speaker 1: and the thing that we're looking for is pretty rare, 489 00:23:32,960 --> 00:23:36,040 Speaker 1: Like it's not like B plus Masons like to decay 490 00:23:36,080 --> 00:23:37,840 Speaker 1: in this way. This is not of like a happy 491 00:23:37,880 --> 00:23:40,280 Speaker 1: way for them to decay. This is very weird. Like 492 00:23:40,320 --> 00:23:43,480 Speaker 1: if you have two million of these B plus Masons, 493 00:23:43,480 --> 00:23:46,120 Speaker 1: maybe one of them will decay in this way by 494 00:23:46,119 --> 00:23:48,760 Speaker 1: going to a kayon and a couple of lectons. So 495 00:23:48,760 --> 00:23:51,320 Speaker 1: you've gotta make a lot of these things because it's 496 00:23:51,480 --> 00:23:54,359 Speaker 1: very rare. Anyway, it's like a rare combination for it 497 00:23:54,400 --> 00:23:57,320 Speaker 1: to decay into. But if it happens, it should happen 498 00:23:57,640 --> 00:23:59,920 Speaker 1: at a certain you know rate. Compare meals on the 499 00:24:00,040 --> 00:24:02,560 Speaker 1: lecrons coming out. Yeah, and this is where the penguins 500 00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:05,000 Speaker 1: come in. If you draw the diagram for a B 501 00:24:05,160 --> 00:24:08,760 Speaker 1: plus Mazon decaying to a kon and two left ons, 502 00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:11,240 Speaker 1: then you make this series of lines that describe like 503 00:24:11,280 --> 00:24:14,200 Speaker 1: where the corks go and what's interacting with what, And 504 00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:16,200 Speaker 1: it sort of looks a little bit like a penguin 505 00:24:16,400 --> 00:24:17,919 Speaker 1: is at the top of the penguin is at the 506 00:24:17,920 --> 00:24:20,639 Speaker 1: bottom of the penguin. I'm not exactly sure anymore, but 507 00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:23,800 Speaker 1: it's a little penguin. Let's just say Daniel did as 508 00:24:23,800 --> 00:24:27,160 Speaker 1: a cartoonist, as a you know, professional and expert opinion, 509 00:24:27,600 --> 00:24:30,240 Speaker 1: this looks nothing like about Okay, I will defer to 510 00:24:30,320 --> 00:24:32,280 Speaker 1: your expert opinion on this one. But the way it 511 00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:34,560 Speaker 1: starts out, you have a B plus mason, which is 512 00:24:34,560 --> 00:24:37,399 Speaker 1: an upcork and an anti bottom and then that anti 513 00:24:37,400 --> 00:24:40,840 Speaker 1: bottom cork changes, it changes to an anti strange cork. 514 00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:42,439 Speaker 1: So when you get out of the end is an 515 00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:45,040 Speaker 1: up cork and an anti strange cork, which is how 516 00:24:45,080 --> 00:24:48,080 Speaker 1: you make the K plus Mazon. So B plus turns 517 00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:50,760 Speaker 1: into a K plus. But you can't just turn an 518 00:24:50,760 --> 00:24:53,600 Speaker 1: anti B cork into an anti escort. That's just like 519 00:24:53,720 --> 00:24:55,760 Speaker 1: changing the flavor of it. When you do that, you 520 00:24:55,800 --> 00:24:58,000 Speaker 1: have to like shoot off another little particle, so you 521 00:24:58,040 --> 00:25:01,119 Speaker 1: get this little loop which makes it upen and inside 522 00:25:01,119 --> 00:25:04,000 Speaker 1: their stuff is happening, and that's where the calculation is 523 00:25:04,160 --> 00:25:06,560 Speaker 1: or like how often do these little particles shoot off 524 00:25:06,560 --> 00:25:09,280 Speaker 1: and let this happen? What happens to those particles, why 525 00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:11,760 Speaker 1: do they sometimes turn into a pair of muance and 526 00:25:11,800 --> 00:25:14,440 Speaker 1: sometimes turn into a pair of electrons? And that's where 527 00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:17,720 Speaker 1: all the sort of nasty gory theoretical calculations have to happen. 528 00:25:17,760 --> 00:25:19,640 Speaker 1: I guess maybe one question is why did you pick 529 00:25:19,800 --> 00:25:24,280 Speaker 1: this particular diagram and interaction to probe or to double 530 00:25:24,359 --> 00:25:26,199 Speaker 1: check that it's doing what the theory says. You know, 531 00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:29,439 Speaker 1: aren't there like a million or maybe infinite number of 532 00:25:29,680 --> 00:25:33,160 Speaker 1: interactions that could happen in a particle collision? White test 533 00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:35,000 Speaker 1: this one? Well, there was a whole argument between the 534 00:25:35,040 --> 00:25:37,520 Speaker 1: penguin community and the eagle community, and that's whole different 535 00:25:37,560 --> 00:25:39,800 Speaker 1: kind of diagram that people wanted to test. You have 536 00:25:39,800 --> 00:25:41,920 Speaker 1: an animal name for each diagram? No, I just totally 537 00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:43,960 Speaker 1: made that up. No, that's a good question. Why do 538 00:25:44,040 --> 00:25:46,520 Speaker 1: we choose this specific diagram? Well, the truth is, we 539 00:25:46,560 --> 00:25:50,280 Speaker 1: would be happy to see deviations anywhere, and personally, I 540 00:25:50,320 --> 00:25:53,600 Speaker 1: would prefer to see deviations not where we expect, not 541 00:25:53,640 --> 00:25:55,840 Speaker 1: where we're looking in the place where we expected to 542 00:25:55,840 --> 00:25:58,120 Speaker 1: see no deviations. It was just like a simple cross check, 543 00:25:58,280 --> 00:26:00,280 Speaker 1: because that would be like more of a surprise, is 544 00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:02,960 Speaker 1: that would be like, huh, you weren't even thinking about 545 00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:05,600 Speaker 1: finding a deviation here and here it is, and that's 546 00:26:05,600 --> 00:26:07,639 Speaker 1: the kind of discovery I'm hoping for, one that like 547 00:26:07,800 --> 00:26:11,439 Speaker 1: really rocks the foundations of physics and makes us rethink everything. 548 00:26:11,560 --> 00:26:13,879 Speaker 1: You mean, like it's simpler interaction, like hey, you know, 549 00:26:13,920 --> 00:26:17,399 Speaker 1: an electron hitting up a positron or something something more basics, 550 00:26:17,480 --> 00:26:19,800 Speaker 1: something more basic, it would be more interesting or even 551 00:26:19,880 --> 00:26:22,320 Speaker 1: just something we didn't expect, because you know, there's a 552 00:26:22,359 --> 00:26:24,760 Speaker 1: lot of theorists out there who have ideas for what 553 00:26:24,880 --> 00:26:27,400 Speaker 1: new particles there might be. We go to the large 554 00:26:27,400 --> 00:26:30,040 Speaker 1: Hadron collider and we can create whatever is out there, 555 00:26:30,240 --> 00:26:32,000 Speaker 1: but we also like to have an idea for what 556 00:26:32,040 --> 00:26:34,560 Speaker 1: we might create. It makes it more powerful to find it. 557 00:26:34,800 --> 00:26:37,119 Speaker 1: It is easier to see something if you know to 558 00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:39,520 Speaker 1: look for it than if you don't. Right, if you're 559 00:26:39,520 --> 00:26:42,000 Speaker 1: looking through a stack of hay and you know you're 560 00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:44,239 Speaker 1: looking for a needle, it's easier than if you're just 561 00:26:44,240 --> 00:26:46,760 Speaker 1: looking for anything that's not Hey. So people have very 562 00:26:46,800 --> 00:26:49,680 Speaker 1: specific ideas for what new particles there might be and 563 00:26:49,840 --> 00:26:52,119 Speaker 1: where we might see them, and so this is a 564 00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:54,600 Speaker 1: very rich area of research where lots of people have 565 00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:56,720 Speaker 1: come up with new ideas for why we might see 566 00:26:56,760 --> 00:27:00,440 Speaker 1: particles in this particular decay and also in the other 567 00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:02,919 Speaker 1: ones that involved be masons. And that's why we have 568 00:27:03,040 --> 00:27:06,520 Speaker 1: this whole experiment LHCb dedicated just to study in the 569 00:27:06,600 --> 00:27:09,680 Speaker 1: decays of particles that have be corks in them, because 570 00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:12,760 Speaker 1: people have identified lots of these weird decays that might 571 00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:15,400 Speaker 1: give us clues about new particles that are out there. Well, 572 00:27:15,400 --> 00:27:18,200 Speaker 1: can you explain it for us, Like why this particular one, 573 00:27:18,320 --> 00:27:22,000 Speaker 1: the supposedly penguin Lincoln one, why this one might be 574 00:27:22,240 --> 00:27:25,399 Speaker 1: especially useful for finding new particles. Yeah. Sure. And the 575 00:27:25,480 --> 00:27:27,920 Speaker 1: reason that bees are exciting is that they have sort 576 00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:30,479 Speaker 1: of a lot of mass. They are heavier particles than 577 00:27:30,520 --> 00:27:32,800 Speaker 1: the other ones, and that just gives them more options, 578 00:27:32,840 --> 00:27:35,360 Speaker 1: Like when they're decaying, there's more stuff that they can 579 00:27:35,359 --> 00:27:37,919 Speaker 1: turn into. Because they're heavier, they have like a bigger 580 00:27:37,960 --> 00:27:40,719 Speaker 1: budget for what they can do. And one thing they 581 00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:43,240 Speaker 1: might do, for example, is turned into this weird new 582 00:27:43,280 --> 00:27:47,040 Speaker 1: particle called a lepto cork. Lepto cork is a particle 583 00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:50,399 Speaker 1: that can talk to corks, and it can talk to leptons, 584 00:27:50,400 --> 00:27:53,359 Speaker 1: and that's very unusual because most of the particles can 585 00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:56,080 Speaker 1: either just talk to corks or to leptons, and like, 586 00:27:56,119 --> 00:27:59,199 Speaker 1: we don't have an idea in the standard model in 587 00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:03,480 Speaker 1: our theory physics for the relationship between quirks and leptons. 588 00:28:03,560 --> 00:28:05,679 Speaker 1: Like we see there are six corks. We see there 589 00:28:05,680 --> 00:28:09,520 Speaker 1: are six leftons. There's a lot of obvious similarities. Leptons 590 00:28:09,520 --> 00:28:12,760 Speaker 1: are like electrons, right right, electrons, muans, tows and all 591 00:28:12,800 --> 00:28:15,480 Speaker 1: the neutrinos. There's six of those, and there's six of 592 00:28:15,480 --> 00:28:18,000 Speaker 1: the corks. And there's a lot of obvious parallels and 593 00:28:18,040 --> 00:28:21,000 Speaker 1: similarities between these two sets of particles. But according to 594 00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:23,639 Speaker 1: our theory, they're totally different. And so it would be 595 00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:26,960 Speaker 1: exciting if we found a new particle that was sort 596 00:28:27,000 --> 00:28:29,320 Speaker 1: of like a combination of a cork and a lepton. 597 00:28:29,400 --> 00:28:31,800 Speaker 1: It would tell us something about how these two very 598 00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:34,600 Speaker 1: different kinds of particles are connected. It would give us 599 00:28:34,640 --> 00:28:37,280 Speaker 1: a clue to like put these two things together in 600 00:28:37,320 --> 00:28:40,600 Speaker 1: the same context, like an intermediary particle, like a link 601 00:28:40,640 --> 00:28:43,920 Speaker 1: in the evolutionary change. Yeah, the missing link particle, something 602 00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:49,720 Speaker 1: that's half unicorn half penguin. Again, there's already waiting for you, 603 00:28:50,080 --> 00:28:52,680 Speaker 1: ding it. Somebody took that parking spot already. And so 604 00:28:52,840 --> 00:28:55,760 Speaker 1: people have this idea that maybe the b cork instead 605 00:28:55,800 --> 00:28:58,480 Speaker 1: of just turning into a strange cork via the interactions 606 00:28:58,480 --> 00:29:02,880 Speaker 1: we know, these penguin dinagram might instead create this lepto cork. 607 00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:05,440 Speaker 1: This is this new particle because bees are sort of 608 00:29:05,440 --> 00:29:08,880 Speaker 1: at the border there, or because this is kind of 609 00:29:08,880 --> 00:29:12,959 Speaker 1: a reaction that involves both leptons and courts. It involves 610 00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:15,440 Speaker 1: both leptons and quirks. And this is not the only 611 00:29:15,480 --> 00:29:17,760 Speaker 1: place you might see lepto corks. We might, for example, 612 00:29:17,880 --> 00:29:20,560 Speaker 1: create them directly at the Large Hadron Collider and we 613 00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:22,640 Speaker 1: study them. We looked for them. I actually worked on 614 00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:25,000 Speaker 1: exactly that research for a while, but we don't have 615 00:29:25,120 --> 00:29:27,400 Speaker 1: enough energy to see them if they do exist. So 616 00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:29,600 Speaker 1: this is like another way to maybe see hints of 617 00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:32,480 Speaker 1: lepto corks is to let them influence the way the 618 00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:35,200 Speaker 1: bees decay. Maybe they play a role in how these 619 00:29:35,240 --> 00:29:40,400 Speaker 1: bees turned into leptons. And they might prefer muans versus electrons. 620 00:29:40,400 --> 00:29:43,680 Speaker 1: Because these lepto corks might for example, only talk to muans, 621 00:29:43,680 --> 00:29:46,680 Speaker 1: are only talk to electrons, they might not be willing 622 00:29:46,800 --> 00:29:49,440 Speaker 1: to interact with the other one. And so it would 623 00:29:49,480 --> 00:29:51,480 Speaker 1: make sense if these things sort of like broke this 624 00:29:51,640 --> 00:29:55,520 Speaker 1: lepton universality, if they preferred one kind of left onto another. 625 00:29:55,600 --> 00:29:57,320 Speaker 1: All right, well, let's get into a little bit more 626 00:29:57,400 --> 00:30:01,080 Speaker 1: detail of what they actually measured and what it could 627 00:30:01,080 --> 00:30:04,120 Speaker 1: mean and whether or not it's a statistical fluke or 628 00:30:04,280 --> 00:30:08,600 Speaker 1: maybe actual unicorn poop. But first let's take another quick break. 629 00:30:21,280 --> 00:30:23,560 Speaker 1: All right, So, Danny, you're smashing particles at the large 630 00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:27,480 Speaker 1: Hattern collider. On every two million collisions or every two 631 00:30:27,480 --> 00:30:30,440 Speaker 1: million times that you make one of these pairs of cords, 632 00:30:30,640 --> 00:30:34,680 Speaker 1: sometimes they go into electrons and sometimes they become muans, 633 00:30:34,680 --> 00:30:37,480 Speaker 1: And that's what you're measuring, right, Like how often that 634 00:30:37,760 --> 00:30:40,560 Speaker 1: one and two million interaction becomes a pair of electrons 635 00:30:40,680 --> 00:30:43,200 Speaker 1: or para muons? And so what did they find? So 636 00:30:43,240 --> 00:30:46,200 Speaker 1: they had hints for a while that maybe things weren't 637 00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:47,959 Speaker 1: looking like they were going to be equal, but they 638 00:30:47,960 --> 00:30:50,200 Speaker 1: didn't really have enough data. You don't expect them to 639 00:30:50,200 --> 00:30:52,360 Speaker 1: be equal, right, you're just checking to see that the 640 00:30:52,400 --> 00:30:55,480 Speaker 1: difference is what you expected to be. Yeah, we expected 641 00:30:55,520 --> 00:30:57,680 Speaker 1: them to be equal if the standard model is correct. 642 00:30:58,080 --> 00:31:01,480 Speaker 1: But we did some early measurements, preliminary studies on a 643 00:31:01,520 --> 00:31:04,240 Speaker 1: small amount of data, and things didn't look balanced. It 644 00:31:04,320 --> 00:31:07,280 Speaker 1: looked like they were preferring one to the other. Specifically, 645 00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:09,920 Speaker 1: it looks like it was preferring electrons to muans, Like 646 00:31:10,080 --> 00:31:12,960 Speaker 1: electron the case were happening more often than muans. So 647 00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:15,560 Speaker 1: everybody got really excited and thought, oh, maybe this is real. 648 00:31:16,080 --> 00:31:18,400 Speaker 1: Let's do a really careful study and will analyze our 649 00:31:18,440 --> 00:31:21,160 Speaker 1: full data set, will use every collision that we can, 650 00:31:21,240 --> 00:31:23,800 Speaker 1: and we'll get a really precise result. And when you 651 00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:25,720 Speaker 1: do this you have to be really careful not to 652 00:31:25,760 --> 00:31:28,840 Speaker 1: introduce bias into your answer. There's lots of different ways 653 00:31:28,880 --> 00:31:31,520 Speaker 1: to analyze these collisions, to look at the data that's 654 00:31:31,520 --> 00:31:34,120 Speaker 1: coming out, and if you know what the answer might be, 655 00:31:34,480 --> 00:31:36,680 Speaker 1: you might be tempted to, you know, like bias it 656 00:31:36,760 --> 00:31:38,880 Speaker 1: not in a conscious way, not in a way where 657 00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:41,000 Speaker 1: you're like, I'm gonna make up some false data. But 658 00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:42,760 Speaker 1: if you have to make a choice between one way 659 00:31:42,760 --> 00:31:45,000 Speaker 1: of doing things another way of doing things, you might, 660 00:31:45,280 --> 00:31:47,440 Speaker 1: you know, prefer to do one way if it leads 661 00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:50,880 Speaker 1: to an exciting result. Twiddle the knobs until you see 662 00:31:50,920 --> 00:31:53,000 Speaker 1: what you want to see. Yeah, and what we want 663 00:31:53,040 --> 00:31:55,400 Speaker 1: to do is measure how likely this is to be 664 00:31:55,440 --> 00:31:58,160 Speaker 1: a random fluctuation. And so to do that, we need 665 00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:00,440 Speaker 1: to make sure not to twiddle the knob because there's 666 00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:03,560 Speaker 1: almost always some way to twiddle the knobs to get 667 00:32:03,600 --> 00:32:06,520 Speaker 1: an interesting result, because if you do enough experiments, is 668 00:32:06,520 --> 00:32:08,680 Speaker 1: always one that's weird. And so we want to make 669 00:32:08,720 --> 00:32:11,479 Speaker 1: sure to be unbiased so that we're like really knowing 670 00:32:11,520 --> 00:32:13,640 Speaker 1: whether what we see is real. And to do that, 671 00:32:13,680 --> 00:32:16,640 Speaker 1: we institute a bunch of controls to make sure that 672 00:32:16,680 --> 00:32:20,320 Speaker 1: nobody is accidentally subconsciously twiddling those knobs. And the way 673 00:32:20,360 --> 00:32:22,440 Speaker 1: we do it is we make the data analysis blind, 674 00:32:22,600 --> 00:32:25,920 Speaker 1: so we like add a big random number to every collision, 675 00:32:26,080 --> 00:32:28,680 Speaker 1: so we don't actually know what they mean, and we 676 00:32:28,720 --> 00:32:31,760 Speaker 1: develop our analysis strategies and all the tools and all 677 00:32:31,760 --> 00:32:34,120 Speaker 1: the programs that we double check them, across check them, 678 00:32:34,160 --> 00:32:36,479 Speaker 1: and we don't like reveal what those random numbers are 679 00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:40,280 Speaker 1: until the very end, until we know what we're doing. 680 00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:42,640 Speaker 1: So it makes for like a big reveal at the end. 681 00:32:42,800 --> 00:32:46,000 Speaker 1: So it's almost like you corrupt the data on purpose 682 00:32:46,360 --> 00:32:49,000 Speaker 1: so that like what you see is not actually anything, 683 00:32:49,120 --> 00:32:51,280 Speaker 1: but then at the end you take out that plant 684 00:32:51,320 --> 00:32:54,280 Speaker 1: that see the corruption. It's like we're working with encrypted 685 00:32:54,360 --> 00:32:56,200 Speaker 1: data and then we type in the password and it 686 00:32:56,200 --> 00:32:58,479 Speaker 1: all becomes clear at the end, and that prevents us 687 00:32:58,520 --> 00:33:01,440 Speaker 1: from like sculpting the data are making choices that might 688 00:33:01,520 --> 00:33:03,520 Speaker 1: lead us down one path or the other. And this 689 00:33:03,560 --> 00:33:05,360 Speaker 1: can go in two directions. You know, it can be 690 00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:08,960 Speaker 1: biased towards repeating the results of previous experiments because like, hey, 691 00:33:09,040 --> 00:33:11,080 Speaker 1: those folks measured this thing, we should probably get a 692 00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:14,280 Speaker 1: number that agrees. And it could also be biased towards 693 00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:16,800 Speaker 1: seeing something new, like who I want to find something 694 00:33:16,800 --> 00:33:19,200 Speaker 1: new and win a Nobel prize. So it's important to 695 00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:22,400 Speaker 1: institute these controls because remember, of science is done by people, 696 00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:25,600 Speaker 1: and people make mistakes, and people have biases, and even 697 00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:27,800 Speaker 1: if they're not actively trying to corrupt these analyses and 698 00:33:27,840 --> 00:33:30,920 Speaker 1: nobody here is, of course, they can subconsciously make choices 699 00:33:31,080 --> 00:33:33,680 Speaker 1: that lead in one direction or another. So we protect 700 00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:36,160 Speaker 1: against that by sort of blinding them from the data. 701 00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:38,120 Speaker 1: But I thought the experiment was being done by penguin. 702 00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:41,680 Speaker 1: Everyone knows they're totally impartial. No way you can buy 703 00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:43,800 Speaker 1: them with a fish or two. Man. The guys are cheap, 704 00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:50,240 Speaker 1: They have no integrity, bad math in penguins. Today you're 705 00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:53,880 Speaker 1: killing penguins and insulting them all in the same experiment then, 706 00:33:54,160 --> 00:33:56,960 Speaker 1: and I'm using them to learn about the universe. Your 707 00:33:57,000 --> 00:34:00,440 Speaker 1: craving nous knows no statistical bount so they made this 708 00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:04,239 Speaker 1: measurement and they got the number, and the result is 709 00:34:04,280 --> 00:34:08,520 Speaker 1: something like point eight four point eight four four exactly. 710 00:34:08,640 --> 00:34:12,520 Speaker 1: What this is the ratio between the muans and the electrons. 711 00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:15,400 Speaker 1: So what this means is that if you have a 712 00:34:15,480 --> 00:34:17,879 Speaker 1: thousand decays and go to electrons, you only have eight 713 00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:20,520 Speaker 1: hundred and forty five they go to muans. And that 714 00:34:20,600 --> 00:34:23,600 Speaker 1: sounds like a pretty big discrepancy. This is much bigger 715 00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:24,920 Speaker 1: than I thought. I thought we were going to be 716 00:34:24,920 --> 00:34:28,600 Speaker 1: seeing something like and we're gonna be wondering if it 717 00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:30,759 Speaker 1: really is close to one. But this thing is like 718 00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:34,640 Speaker 1: pretty far from balanced, Like point eight four is pretty 719 00:34:34,680 --> 00:34:38,040 Speaker 1: far away, and the uncertainties on that are pretty small. 720 00:34:38,400 --> 00:34:41,959 Speaker 1: They're pretty confident. This isn't just a statistical fluctuation. I see. 721 00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:44,279 Speaker 1: But I thought you were expecting there to be not 722 00:34:44,400 --> 00:34:46,520 Speaker 1: the same, Or are you saying that you were expecting 723 00:34:46,520 --> 00:34:48,600 Speaker 1: them to be the same, or the theory says they 724 00:34:48,640 --> 00:34:50,360 Speaker 1: should be the same, and the theory says they should 725 00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:52,960 Speaker 1: be very very close to the same, very very close 726 00:34:52,960 --> 00:34:54,279 Speaker 1: to one. And we do a bunch of stuff to 727 00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:56,600 Speaker 1: remove any other sort of biases, like the way that 728 00:34:56,640 --> 00:34:59,880 Speaker 1: we see electrons versus the way we see muans or 729 00:35:00,000 --> 00:35:02,080 Speaker 1: the fact that the muan is slightly heavier by doing 730 00:35:02,120 --> 00:35:05,160 Speaker 1: a double ratio with another pair of decays, that helps 731 00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:08,000 Speaker 1: protect against making sure that there's no biases. So we 732 00:35:08,040 --> 00:35:10,799 Speaker 1: would expect this number to be exactly one if there 733 00:35:10,880 --> 00:35:13,480 Speaker 1: was lept On Universality, because everything else has been removed. 734 00:35:13,800 --> 00:35:16,880 Speaker 1: But instead we see it's like eighty five percent instead 735 00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:19,200 Speaker 1: of one, and so that's a pretty big difference. You 736 00:35:19,239 --> 00:35:22,359 Speaker 1: said the words leapt On Universality. What does that mean 737 00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:25,000 Speaker 1: is that like the Dipton University or it's a different 738 00:35:25,040 --> 00:35:27,439 Speaker 1: campus lept On Universality. That's just a way of saying 739 00:35:27,480 --> 00:35:30,200 Speaker 1: that the universe treats the electrons and the muans and 740 00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:33,759 Speaker 1: the towels the same way. You know, it's democratic that 741 00:35:33,800 --> 00:35:36,279 Speaker 1: these particles should all appear at the same rate when 742 00:35:36,280 --> 00:35:38,640 Speaker 1: you have a particle decaying. So that's what we're testing. 743 00:35:38,719 --> 00:35:42,279 Speaker 1: So then you measure these outcomes electrons versus muons, and 744 00:35:42,320 --> 00:35:44,200 Speaker 1: you found that one comes out more than the other, 745 00:35:44,320 --> 00:35:47,080 Speaker 1: which could mean something. And is it pretty conclusive or 746 00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:49,239 Speaker 1: are you still sort of in the initial stages where 747 00:35:49,239 --> 00:35:51,880 Speaker 1: it could maybe be a statistical fluke. It could still 748 00:35:51,920 --> 00:35:54,400 Speaker 1: be a statistical fluke, and there's a lot of discussion 749 00:35:54,440 --> 00:35:57,120 Speaker 1: about exactly what it means. You know, they spent a 750 00:35:57,120 --> 00:35:59,400 Speaker 1: lot of time doing a very careful analysis of the 751 00:35:59,480 --> 00:36:03,120 Speaker 1: uncertainty these and they can measure how likely they are 752 00:36:03,160 --> 00:36:06,480 Speaker 1: to see a result this far from one if it 753 00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,040 Speaker 1: was just a random chance, you know, because things do 754 00:36:09,200 --> 00:36:11,840 Speaker 1: happen that are random, and the experiment you do that 755 00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:14,680 Speaker 1: has quantum fluctuations and it can in principle give you 756 00:36:14,719 --> 00:36:17,720 Speaker 1: any answer. It's like having a room full of monkeys. 757 00:36:18,000 --> 00:36:19,880 Speaker 1: If you have enough monkeys and you let them go 758 00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:22,279 Speaker 1: for long enough, eventually one of them will start a 759 00:36:22,320 --> 00:36:25,000 Speaker 1: podcast or type out Hamlet or whatever. Right, And so 760 00:36:25,040 --> 00:36:27,040 Speaker 1: what you want to do is measure how likely is 761 00:36:27,080 --> 00:36:29,719 Speaker 1: it for the real answer to be one, but then 762 00:36:29,800 --> 00:36:32,880 Speaker 1: for random fluctuations to give you an answer that looks 763 00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:35,440 Speaker 1: like point eight five. So you can do the statistical 764 00:36:35,480 --> 00:36:38,600 Speaker 1: calculation and ask how often does that happen? And in 765 00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:41,960 Speaker 1: particle physics we tend to translate that into units of sigma, 766 00:36:42,080 --> 00:36:45,080 Speaker 1: like how far from the Gaussian mean are you? And 767 00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:47,520 Speaker 1: in this case there are about three sigma away, which 768 00:36:47,520 --> 00:36:49,960 Speaker 1: is pretty good. It means it's like one and one 769 00:36:50,080 --> 00:36:53,719 Speaker 1: thousand chance of the answer actually being one and having 770 00:36:53,760 --> 00:36:57,320 Speaker 1: just like weird fluctuations conspire to give them this result. 771 00:36:57,520 --> 00:37:00,920 Speaker 1: So it's the three sigma I know is pretty good, 772 00:37:00,920 --> 00:37:03,520 Speaker 1: but like this gold standard's supposed to be five sigma. 773 00:37:03,760 --> 00:37:06,600 Speaker 1: Gold standard is five stigma. We have this word in 774 00:37:06,680 --> 00:37:09,760 Speaker 1: particle physics for discovery, and you can't write a paper 775 00:37:09,880 --> 00:37:12,880 Speaker 1: with discovery in it unless you have five stigma. If 776 00:37:12,920 --> 00:37:15,839 Speaker 1: you have four sigma, you can call it observation. If 777 00:37:15,840 --> 00:37:18,319 Speaker 1: you have three sigma, you can call it evidence. So 778 00:37:18,360 --> 00:37:20,880 Speaker 1: there's all these words that translate the number of sigma 779 00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:23,360 Speaker 1: into the words that you can use, and six sigma 780 00:37:23,520 --> 00:37:27,640 Speaker 1: is like holy cattle or oh my god, or it 781 00:37:27,760 --> 00:37:31,120 Speaker 1: is the unicorn poop. And there's a reason that we 782 00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:34,120 Speaker 1: are skeptical that we have this standard of five stigma 783 00:37:34,200 --> 00:37:36,200 Speaker 1: because you might think, well, isn't one in a thousand 784 00:37:36,280 --> 00:37:39,000 Speaker 1: good enough? Like that seems like pretty unlikely that this 785 00:37:39,080 --> 00:37:41,440 Speaker 1: is a fluctuation. The problem is that we do a 786 00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:44,120 Speaker 1: lot of experiments. This is not the only measurement we've 787 00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:46,520 Speaker 1: made the large aging collider. It's not the only measurement 788 00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:49,239 Speaker 1: made at this experiment. It's not the only measurement made 789 00:37:49,239 --> 00:37:52,319 Speaker 1: with B plus masons at this experiment. So if you 790 00:37:52,400 --> 00:37:57,200 Speaker 1: do a thousand experiments, each of which have different statistical fluctuations, 791 00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:00,000 Speaker 1: then you would expect that one out of those thousands 792 00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:02,520 Speaker 1: we give you a false positive, even if those false 793 00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:05,040 Speaker 1: positives have a one in a thousand chance of happening. 794 00:38:05,560 --> 00:38:08,200 Speaker 1: If you do enough experiments, you will see these rare 795 00:38:08,239 --> 00:38:11,000 Speaker 1: false positives, and we do a lot. And also, you're 796 00:38:11,239 --> 00:38:13,239 Speaker 1: making big claims about the universe, so you want to 797 00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:15,520 Speaker 1: be super extra sure. One in a thousand is not 798 00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:18,120 Speaker 1: good enough to challenge our view of the universe. Yeah, 799 00:38:18,120 --> 00:38:21,120 Speaker 1: and particle physics tends to be very very conservative about 800 00:38:21,160 --> 00:38:24,840 Speaker 1: making claims. They would rather wait and make the discovery 801 00:38:24,920 --> 00:38:26,920 Speaker 1: in an extra couple of years or when they have 802 00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:30,600 Speaker 1: more data, than make a false discovery and claim to 803 00:38:30,640 --> 00:38:33,359 Speaker 1: discover something and then have it not be true because 804 00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:36,680 Speaker 1: people remember that. Remember when people thought we had neutrinos 805 00:38:36,719 --> 00:38:38,680 Speaker 1: going faster than the speed of light. A lot more 806 00:38:38,719 --> 00:38:42,120 Speaker 1: people remember that then basically anything else we've discovered, because 807 00:38:42,120 --> 00:38:44,000 Speaker 1: that was a big embarrassment, and so we try to 808 00:38:44,040 --> 00:38:46,640 Speaker 1: be very conservative and wait until we're really pretty sure. 809 00:38:46,800 --> 00:38:49,640 Speaker 1: That's why we have this kind of arbitrary standard of 810 00:38:49,680 --> 00:38:52,400 Speaker 1: five stigma. One in a hundred thousand chance of a 811 00:38:52,440 --> 00:38:56,000 Speaker 1: fluctuation before we sort of officially believe something. All right, 812 00:38:56,000 --> 00:38:59,400 Speaker 1: So you found something that might be possibly something that 813 00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:01,600 Speaker 1: tells you either something going on here, it's not what 814 00:39:01,800 --> 00:39:05,040 Speaker 1: the standard model predicts in physics, and so what's the 815 00:39:05,120 --> 00:39:07,520 Speaker 1: view of what could be happening. Like you mentioned that 816 00:39:08,239 --> 00:39:12,440 Speaker 1: maybe these the masons are transforming into a lepto quark 817 00:39:13,120 --> 00:39:15,880 Speaker 1: before they transform into the other particles. Yeah, so this 818 00:39:16,040 --> 00:39:18,760 Speaker 1: sort of the spectrum of possibilities from the most boring 819 00:39:18,880 --> 00:39:21,799 Speaker 1: to the craziest. The most boring explanation for this is 820 00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:24,279 Speaker 1: that somebody's made a mistake, you know, that it's just 821 00:39:24,360 --> 00:39:27,719 Speaker 1: wrong somewhere, that they forgot to account for something, or 822 00:39:27,840 --> 00:39:30,120 Speaker 1: they're not seeing something right. And so the best way 823 00:39:30,120 --> 00:39:32,680 Speaker 1: to check that is to do a completely different experiment 824 00:39:32,680 --> 00:39:35,080 Speaker 1: at a different accelerator, using a different detector and a 825 00:39:35,120 --> 00:39:37,960 Speaker 1: different group of people. And so there's a Japanese experiment 826 00:39:38,239 --> 00:39:41,120 Speaker 1: that's running, and they will give us a totally independent 827 00:39:41,120 --> 00:39:43,600 Speaker 1: measurement of exactly the same effect, and since it's in 828 00:39:43,640 --> 00:39:46,359 Speaker 1: the same universe, it should be the same number if 829 00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:49,160 Speaker 1: they did it correctly. And so currently the results from 830 00:39:49,160 --> 00:39:53,640 Speaker 1: the Japanese experiment don't agree with these results. Their number 831 00:39:53,719 --> 00:39:55,719 Speaker 1: is like, you know, close to one, but it has 832 00:39:55,760 --> 00:39:58,919 Speaker 1: a really big error bar. So actually does agree because 833 00:39:58,960 --> 00:40:01,480 Speaker 1: this new result is within air borros of the old one, 834 00:40:01,560 --> 00:40:03,560 Speaker 1: but the old one sees something a little bit larger 835 00:40:03,600 --> 00:40:06,160 Speaker 1: than one. So the most boring answer is somebody made 836 00:40:06,160 --> 00:40:08,440 Speaker 1: a mistake. It will get resolved in a few years 837 00:40:08,440 --> 00:40:10,759 Speaker 1: when they do more careful experiments. Well, I think the 838 00:40:10,800 --> 00:40:13,480 Speaker 1: problem is probably that you know, unicorns in Japan they 839 00:40:13,560 --> 00:40:16,200 Speaker 1: do tend to be a little bit different than unicorns 840 00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:18,200 Speaker 1: in Switzerland. I think either different kind of chocolate, and 841 00:40:18,239 --> 00:40:21,520 Speaker 1: I think that really affects their poop. No, I'm just kidding, 842 00:40:21,520 --> 00:40:24,320 Speaker 1: all right, So then what's the exciting possibilities that the 843 00:40:24,360 --> 00:40:27,239 Speaker 1: particles are transforming into these new kinds of particles called 844 00:40:27,280 --> 00:40:30,040 Speaker 1: lepto corks. Yeah, the more exciting possibility is that this 845 00:40:30,080 --> 00:40:31,920 Speaker 1: is a hint of something new. This is what we've 846 00:40:31,960 --> 00:40:34,440 Speaker 1: been waiting for the large age on collider. We've been 847 00:40:34,520 --> 00:40:37,160 Speaker 1: hoping to find some new physics, some clue that tells 848 00:40:37,280 --> 00:40:39,760 Speaker 1: us the secrets of the universe, that helps us understand 849 00:40:39,760 --> 00:40:42,800 Speaker 1: how all these particles fit together to explain the fundamental 850 00:40:42,880 --> 00:40:45,360 Speaker 1: nature of matter. And so this could be that moment 851 00:40:45,400 --> 00:40:47,640 Speaker 1: that cracks it open. It could be that this is 852 00:40:47,680 --> 00:40:49,480 Speaker 1: the sign of a lepto corep. But you know, there's 853 00:40:49,520 --> 00:40:52,000 Speaker 1: lots of other people out there with other ideas for 854 00:40:52,080 --> 00:40:55,120 Speaker 1: new particles that could explain this. One problem with this 855 00:40:55,200 --> 00:40:57,960 Speaker 1: discovery again is that we don't know exactly what it is. 856 00:40:58,000 --> 00:41:00,879 Speaker 1: It's sort of indirect so we can't see this new 857 00:41:00,920 --> 00:41:03,840 Speaker 1: particle and like measure its mass and see what it 858 00:41:03,880 --> 00:41:06,359 Speaker 1: turns into and see what it interacts with. We're only 859 00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:08,920 Speaker 1: seeing like the scratches on the trees and the shape 860 00:41:08,920 --> 00:41:11,839 Speaker 1: of the footprints in the ground. We're not actually seeing 861 00:41:11,880 --> 00:41:14,399 Speaker 1: the thing directly. So it opens the door for lots 862 00:41:14,440 --> 00:41:16,880 Speaker 1: of fun ideas, and I expect to see lots of 863 00:41:16,920 --> 00:41:20,160 Speaker 1: cool papers with exciting new theoretical ideas on the web 864 00:41:20,200 --> 00:41:22,160 Speaker 1: in the next few days as people get their like 865 00:41:22,239 --> 00:41:25,399 Speaker 1: intellectual juices flowing about what could explain this? All right, 866 00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:28,040 Speaker 1: I guess stay tuned. Maybe this is the first hint 867 00:41:28,120 --> 00:41:32,400 Speaker 1: of something that cracks open the standard model and hints 868 00:41:32,400 --> 00:41:37,799 Speaker 1: at new unicorn particles, or maybe Daniel run but we'll 869 00:41:37,800 --> 00:41:39,560 Speaker 1: find out. I think that these guys have done it 870 00:41:39,719 --> 00:41:42,800 Speaker 1: very careful analysis. I know these physicists and our colleagues, 871 00:41:42,840 --> 00:41:45,160 Speaker 1: and some of them my friends. They know what they're doing. 872 00:41:45,280 --> 00:41:47,319 Speaker 1: Way I thought you didn't know them, Daniel. Now they're 873 00:41:47,320 --> 00:41:49,680 Speaker 1: you're best friends. They're on a different experiment, but you know, 874 00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:52,520 Speaker 1: certain is a very friendly place. Wasted in the cafeteria 875 00:41:52,680 --> 00:41:55,000 Speaker 1: and eat ice cream and talk about whatever. And also 876 00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:57,440 Speaker 1: people move from the experiment to experiments. So some of 877 00:41:57,440 --> 00:41:59,120 Speaker 1: the folks on led c B used to work on 878 00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:01,279 Speaker 1: Atlas or in a pre this experiment with me. The 879 00:42:01,360 --> 00:42:03,680 Speaker 1: tight community, so we all do know each other. You 880 00:42:03,800 --> 00:42:06,520 Speaker 1: just place yourself on the PETA target list there, Daniel, 881 00:42:06,920 --> 00:42:11,120 Speaker 1: for experimenting with penguins, only virtual penguins, particle physics penguins. 882 00:42:11,200 --> 00:42:12,640 Speaker 1: But I have a lot of faith in these guys. 883 00:42:12,719 --> 00:42:15,799 Speaker 1: I think that this experimental result is probably correct. I 884 00:42:15,920 --> 00:42:18,080 Speaker 1: just don't know what it means, and I think it's 885 00:42:18,120 --> 00:42:21,080 Speaker 1: more exciting than the Muan g Mind is too result 886 00:42:21,120 --> 00:42:24,840 Speaker 1: that came out just afterwards, because the theoretical reference numbers 887 00:42:24,880 --> 00:42:28,680 Speaker 1: are better understood here, and there are other results from 888 00:42:28,719 --> 00:42:32,200 Speaker 1: beak work studies that give similar hints that something fishy 889 00:42:32,440 --> 00:42:34,759 Speaker 1: is going on with these penguin. The case, all right, 890 00:42:34,800 --> 00:42:37,399 Speaker 1: we'll stay tuned. Then we'll wait to see what other 891 00:42:37,440 --> 00:42:40,560 Speaker 1: people say about it, whether it confirms or whether it 892 00:42:40,640 --> 00:42:43,240 Speaker 1: points to something else going on. Yeah, and it's exciting 893 00:42:43,239 --> 00:42:45,440 Speaker 1: to see some new results coming out from certain and 894 00:42:45,520 --> 00:42:48,120 Speaker 1: to see the world of physics giving us hints about 895 00:42:48,160 --> 00:42:51,000 Speaker 1: how the universe actually works. And if you see a 896 00:42:51,040 --> 00:42:53,359 Speaker 1: study out there that you'd like to understand better, please 897 00:42:53,400 --> 00:42:55,000 Speaker 1: send it to us. We would love to break it 898 00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:57,719 Speaker 1: down and explain the universe to you. I hope that 899 00:42:57,840 --> 00:43:00,960 Speaker 1: was interesting and do you enjoyed that. Thanks for joining us, 900 00:43:01,560 --> 00:43:11,600 Speaker 1: See you next time. Thanks for listening, and remember that 901 00:43:11,719 --> 00:43:14,440 Speaker 1: Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of 902 00:43:14,560 --> 00:43:17,919 Speaker 1: I Heart Radio or more podcast from my Heart Radio. 903 00:43:18,080 --> 00:43:21,640 Speaker 1: Visit the I Heart Radio Apple Apple Podcasts, or wherever 904 00:43:21,760 --> 00:43:23,440 Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.