image copyrightCERN/Getty Images
Scientists detected signals from the smallest scale in nature ever explored: 100 billion times smaller than an atom.
A world so small that some physicists have dubbed it the zeptoverse.
The research, led by Cambridge-based scientists, was derived from an experiment conducted at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
This enormous machine, located at the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN), on the Swiss-French border, near Geneva, collides atoms to separate them and discover what is inside.
The discovery, which comes after more than 40 years of searching, could help researchers explore a mysterious world billions of times smaller than an atom, and develop a new, more complete theory of how the universe works.
"Knocking on the door" of the zeptoverse
Dark matter makes up a large part of our cosmos, yet researchers have had difficulty detecting it.
Scientists know it is there because its gravitational pull influences ordinary matter, but in all other respects it has remained completely invisible.
In this experiment, particles were collided at high energy and scientists studied the material that was ejected: the fragments resulting from the collisions.
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One of them is a subatomic particle, smaller than an atom, called a bottom quark or bottom quark (or also a "beauty" quark).
The particle is unstable and exists for only one and a half billionths of a second before decaying into other forms, that is, disintegrating.
Despite its short lifespan, the researchers managed to detect its interaction with other tiny particles at a scale of one billionth of a meter.
Some theories suggest that, at these scales, particles are more sensitive to dark matter, which could influence the interaction and decay of quarks.
Therefore, detecting activity in this tiny universe could help scientists detect dark matter.
image copyrightJoshua Falcon/BBC
"Physicists have been searching for this rare type of decay since 1984, before I was born," said Dr. Harry Cliff of the University of Cambridge, who led the analysis of the data.
As he explained, this subatomic dance provided researchers with a privileged perspective on the behavior of possible new particles.
"We're knocking on the door of this zeptoverse," he told BBC News.
"What we want to do now is go in, explore and find out what new particles are waiting for us. And to do that, we need more data," added Cliff.
Professor Brian Cox, a renowned science communicator and particle physics researcher at the University of Manchester, who is not part of the research team, described the result as "important".
The findings, which have not yet undergone peer review, are presented this Monday at CERN.
British involvement
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The 28 countries participating in the project have agreed to contribute US$200 million to modernize this detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHCb), which would increase the frequency of these decays tenfold.
Scientists hope that further improvements in the collider's equipment, planned for the 2030s, will allow them to examine these rare events in much greater detail.
"With that we can delve into the zeptoverse and see what awaits us," Cliff said.
However, last year, the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) agency, the government body in charge of funding research, announced that it was withdrawing its share of the money allocated for the planned improvement.
Although this research was led by Cambridge-based scientists, due to cuts, Professor Tim Gershon, who leads the international LHCb collaboration, told BBC News that the UK's full participation in the research would be in doubt.
"The UK runs the risk of not participating and not making really important discoveries," he told BBC News.
*With reporting by BBC News Science Correspondent Pallab Gosh and Science Reporter Josh Falcon.
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