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| CERN: An illustration of the possible layout of quarks in a pentaquark (Time) |
Topics: Large Hadron Collider, LHC, Particle Physics, Quarks, Quantum Mechanics, Theoretical Physics
Actually, the idea of a pentaquark - penta = 5; quark, the building blocks of matter consists of 4 quarks and 1 antiquark bound together has been around for a while, at least quarks theoretically since the 1960s. The LHC - the celebrated particle accelerator of Higgs Boson fame, found strong evidence , but the Jefferson Lab in Newport News, Virginia saw experimental evidence in 2003, and hints at the LHC recently. I'm going to go with Time (also source of the illustration) and the BBC write ups, excerpted because of their gasping fan "cuteness." However, I do appreciate the attempt at increasing the physics literacy of the general public that's of late is hostile to all things science. Note on the link to "LHCb collaboration": there are a LOT of collaborators, but if you want, they're #2 on the page search results at the link.
Time: The discovery may provide hints as to what happens when giant stars collapse
Physicists at the Large Hadron Collider at the CERN in Switzerland announced the discovery of a new particle, the pentaquark.
The Collider, which smashes atoms together, showed signs of the pentaquark in 2011 and 2012, but scientists wanted to make absolutely sure of its existence before announcing its discovery. Tanya Basu
BBC: Scientists at the Large Hadron Collider have announced the discovery of a new particle called the pentaquark.
It was first predicted to exist in the 1960s but, much like the Higgs boson particle before it, the pentaquark eluded science for decades until its detection at the LHC.
The discovery, which amounts to a new form of matter, was made by the Hadron Collider's LHCb experiment.
The findings have been submitted to the journal Physical Review Letters. Paul Rincon
Physics arXiv:
Observation of J/ψp resonances consistent with pentaquark states in Λ0b→J/ψK−p decays
LHCb collaboration
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