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New evidence from the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago
seems to point to a subatomic particle, called a muon, behaving in a way that it should not. It
is believed that every particle has what is called a magnetic moment;
and this is essentially a sort of wobble. Each type of particle has a very precise
value for this magnetic moment. When they ran their experiments, they
discovered something rather curious. The muon seemed to be wobbling a lot
more than the theory predicted. The scientists who discovered this think
that the best explanation for this, is that the muon is being pushed around
by types of matter and energy completely unknown to physics. The
current model has remained largely unchanged in the last 50 years,
and this small discovery could well shake the entire foundation that this is built on.
Muons can be thought of as fat electrons as they are similar to a regular electron, but are
200 times heavier and are also radioactively unstable, decaying in a mere millionth of a second
into electrons and the elusive neutrino. In the experiments they sent the muons
into a superconducting ring and this seemed to show that it was wobbling
far more than it should. The wobble, they think, is related to the spin of the particle.
The idea of spin was first discovered in the 1920’s by Otto Stern
and Walter Gerlach. They shot silver atoms through a varying magnetic field,
and saw something that they couldn't explain. The silver atoms were neutral, so
had an equal number of protons and electrons. They had expected to find one of two
possible results. Number 1: the neutrality of the atoms would nullify
any interactions with the magnetic field, and they would travel in a straight line.
Number 2: if the atoms behaved like spheres that could also spin on their axes,
then this angular momentum would interact with the surrounding magnetic field,
producing a torque. Since each atom would have a random spin,
and hence torque, it would scatter the atoms in all directions.
What they discovered was actually none of these. When they examined the results, what they
actually saw was, that there were two very distinct trajectories from the silver atoms.
One group heading upwards and the other heading downwards.
The experiment revealed that particles that make up the atom,
had previously unknown properties that were only revealed by the magnetic field.
Since the atoms sort of behave like spinning balls of electric charge, this property was dubbed spin.
From this point onwards particles would have three properties: mass, charge and spin.
Through experiments it was determined that the spin property is a fixed quantity. The problem was that
Schrodinger's equations did not take account of any spin and it would be Dirac who would come up
with a mathematics that would bridge the gap and allow quantum mechanics to work with
special relativity. The behavior of these particles is far more complex
than a simple spinning sphere. In fact, it is fair to say that there is no useful
metaphor for this property at all. In classical physics, the magnetic spin
moment would be equal to a half multiplied by the ratio of its electric charge,
to its mass, multiplied by its spin angular momentum. However, in quantum mechanics it all gets
multiplied by a pre-factor which is called g. If the universe were purely quantum mechanical in nature
g would equal 2 and this is exactly what Dirac had predicted.
As you might be able to guess, g does not equal 2. Scientists claim that this means that
the universe is not just quantum mechanical. Instead, there are also fields that
permeate the universe which are responsible for carrying the forces. So, these fields
also interact with all the particles, meaning g cannot be equal to 2. This value has
been observed for electrons for a long period of time. As they have very little mass, they
predominantly interact with the electromagnetic force. This in turn means that the g2 effects
are dominated by the electromagnetic force and we can calculate the magnetic moment
to 13 decimal places for the electron. The muon is a different case. It is unstable,
but has over 200 times the mass of an electron. This makes its magnetic moment much
smaller than the electron, and this also means that they believe it
interacts with the strong force much more compared to the electron. It is
here that the scientists have found a difference with what their equations predicted,
and what is actually being measured. A rival team however would like to pour
cold water on their findings and are rushing to publish a paper that
would in fact allow for this greater wobble to exist within the existing models,
and no new models would be required. Their calculations also follow the rules of the Standard
Model but they relied upon a totally different calculation with very different assumptions.
This shows that the physicists cannot agree on exactly how the 17 existing
standard model particles interact with muons, allowing for the different interpretations.
At this stage it is important to take a little step back, and just examine the experiment, to
understand what might be going on. Firstly, they generate muons by firing protons at a target.
The collision is thought to release energy which gets turned into matter.
It creates something called a pion, which almost immediately decays, forming a muon.
This muon lasts for a short period, before decaying into an electron
and some neutrino particles. We cannot see or measure pions. They are a theoretical particle.
The same can be said for the neutrino. We can only detect the neutrinos by their
interaction with other particles. If we examine the muon, it presents a
rather interesting case that seems to highlight many of the problems with
particle physics today. It is essentially an electron which is thought to have more mass.
This particle can only be made through collisions with other particles
and more specifically, atoms. The Standard Model holds that there are protons and
neutrons in the nucleus, held together by a force called the strong nuclear force.
This stops the protons from flying away from each other and binds them into the nucleus. There is
no order to their nucleus, and protons and neutrons occupy random locations.
And yet, radioactive decay will always result in the production
of certain smaller components, irrespective of this randomness.
The Structured Atom Model shows us a different way of looking at this.
Instead, there are no neutrons, and there is no strong nuclear force.
Protons are held in the nucleus by electrons. An electron and a proton pair is what we
see as a neutron. If we add into this the idea of platonic solids and use a simple densest packing
rule, we can now create complex atomic nuclei following a very simple set of rules.
Even more remarkable is that this structure, and its instabilities in certain parts,
perfectly matches and explains why certain elements are unstable,
and why they decay into specific products. So why is this relevant to muons?
In the mainstream model electrons do not exist within the nucleus.
The muon is produced by colliding a particle with an atom. We know that a neutron decays into an
electron and a proton and an antineutrino, within about 15 minutes.
Another clue comes from the fact that they are able to create muon atoms.
Muonic hydrogen has the muon orbiting much closer to the hydrogen
than a normal atom. There is also a process called muon capture.
Here a proton and a negative muon join, resulting in the production of a neutron
and a neutrino and sometimes a gamma ray. The muon can be drawn in from the atomic
orbital to form a neutron inside the nucleus. This is actually
being investigated for the application in radioactive waste disposal and this
would allow them to transmute the radioactive element into something else. We must also
consider what exactly mass is. If we examine the famous E=mc2
equation, we understand from this that as particles travel at relativistic
speeds, their mass will increase. Wal Thornhill pointed out that this
is simply an interpretation of the observations from particle accelerators. Here they
accelerate protons and electrons in an electric field and notice that they become less
responsive to this field. If, as Wal suggests, these particles are
made up of smaller sub particles which also orbit around a central charge,
then as the particles accelerate, their orbits will become more and more
elliptical as more and more force is applied. This is used in the distortion of this
orbit, rather than in the acceleration of the particle itself.
So in the case of a muon, might this still simply be an electron
but in a different excited state? Meaning it does not respond to the electric
field in the same way as an electron. Did the initial collision cause one of
the internal electrons inside the nucleus, to be liberated in this excited state?
This state is unstable and this energy is eventually released, and all that remains is the electron.
Again, we must come back to the concept that there is something fundamentally wrong with particle
physics. This is the tip of the iceberg, and the fact that they see a discrepancy from their
theoretical models with their observations, may indeed open up the avenue for them
to explore an alternative to this particle zoo that they have created.
Although, I wouldn't be surprised if they simply invent another member of this zoo
to fix the problem. That being said, there is still much work
to do in finding a working alternative to all the phenomena we see.
SAM is an excellent step in the right direction, but understandably their efforts are
focused on the known atoms and explaining all the phenomena,
before they then tackle the more exotic phenomena we see. They have already shown that in
radioactive decay, there is no need for the neutrino, and a positron
can be explained as an electron moving into the nucleus of the atom.
When you strip away what is actually observed in these experiments,
there is room for a totally different interpretation of the data.
Which may suggest a much simpler, more logical way in which mother nature works, and would
remove Feynman's classical quote where he said, “The theory of quantum Electrodynamics describes
nature as absurd from the point of view of common sense. And it fully agrees with experiment. So I
hope you can accept nature as she is – Absurd.” Instead, we should view mother nature
in a logical hierarchical fashion where everything has a purpose,
where less is more and in this case, the removal of the strong nuclear force,
once more points to the electrical nature of mother nature.
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