“All our observations find a complete symmetry between matter and antimatter, why our Universe shouldn’t exist”, says Christian Smorra from the collaboration BASE at the research center CERN. “There has to be asymmetry, but we just don’t understand where. What breaks the symmetry, what is the source?”.
The search continues. Still between protons and antiprotons was not detected any difference, but it could explain the existence of matter in our Universe. However physics, in collaboration BASE at the research center CERN was able to measure the magnetic force on the antiproton with unprecedented precision. However, these data did not provide any information on how matter was formed in the early Universe, because particles and antiparticles should have been to completely destroy each other.
The last measurement BASE showed complete identity of protons and antiprotons, once again confirming the Standard model of particle physics. Scientists around the world have resorted to various methods to find any differences of any magnitude. The imbalance of matter-antimatter in the Universe — one of the hottest discussion topics in modern physics.
Multinational cooperation BASE in CERN brings together scientists from universities and institutes around the world. They with great precision by comparing the magnetic properties of the protons and antiprotons. The magnetic moment is an important component of the particles and can be represented approximately as the equivalent of a miniature bar magnet. The so-called g-factor measures the strength of the magnetic field.
“The main issue — whether the antiproton has the same magnetism as the proton,” explains Stefan Ulmer, a spokesman for the group BASE. “That’s the mystery we need to solve.”
BASE collaboration presented high-precision measurements of antiproton g-factor back in January of 2017, but the current measurements are much more accurate. High-precision current measurement has determined the g-factor to nine significant digits. This is equivalent to measuring the circumference of the Earth accurate to four inches. The value 2,7928473441(42) 350 times more accurate results published in January.
“This is a remarkable increase of accuracy in such a short period of time became possible only thanks to completely new techniques,” says Ulmer. Scientists took two antiproton and analyzed them using two penning traps.
Antiprotons at CERN are created artificially, and the scientists keeping them trapped for the experiment. The antiprotons for the current experiment were isolated in 2015 and are measured from August to December 2016. In fact, this is the longest period of storage of antimatter. Antiprotons 405 days were in a vacuum, which was ten times less particles than in interstellar space. A total of used 16 antiprotons, cooled to a temperature of almost absolute zero.
The measured g-factor of the antiproton compared with g-factor of the proton which has been measured with incredible precision, even in 2014. In the end, was not found any difference. This confirms the CPT-symmetry, according to which in the Universe there is a fundamental symmetry between particles and antiparticles.
Now, scientists BASE will have to develop and implement methods more high-precision measurements of the properties of the proton and the antiproton, to find the answer to all question.
CERN: our Universe shouldn’t exist
Ilya Hel