Particles found to break speed of light

Science • September 2011 • Views: 3,129

Amazing!

(Reuters) - An international team of scientists said on Thursday they had recorded sub-atomic particles traveling faster than light — a finding that could overturn one of Einstein’s long-accepted fundamental laws of the universe.

Antonio Ereditato, spokesman for the researchers, told Reuters that measurements taken over three years showed neutrinos pumped from CERN near Geneva to Gran Sasso in Italy had arrived 60 nanoseconds quicker than light would have done.

“We have high confidence in our results. We have checked and rechecked for anything that could have distorted our measurements but we found nothing,” he said. “We now want colleagues to check them independently.”

If confirmed, the discovery would undermine Albert Einstein’s 1905 theory of special relativity, which says that the speed of light is a “cosmic constant” and that nothing in the universe can travel faster.

Cern Science

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37 comments

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:19:46pm

I would love to see Ludwig vQ comment here.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:20:40pm

First off, neutrinos have mass.

Let me repeat, they have mass.

That means they must move slower than light always.

I will buy this as soon as I buy a perpetual motion machine. The most likely explanation is some form of systematic error on the part of the Italians.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:21:00pm

re: #1 imp_62

I would love to see Ludwig vQ comment here.

wish and you shall receive.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:23:50pm

From the article:

Ereditato declined to speculate on what it might mean if other physicists, who will be officially informed of the discovery at a meeting in CERN on Friday, found that OPERA's measurements were correct.

Bad, bad sign. Going to the papers before publishing. The last people to go to the papers first without publishing on something this big were Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons.

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:25:33pm

re: #4 LudwigVanQuixote

From the article:

Bad, bad sign. Going to the papers before publishing. The last people to go to the papers first without publishing on something this big were Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons.

Cold fusion, right? (Without googling).

Decatur Deb Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:27:23pm

re: #2 LudwigVanQuixote

First off, neutrinos have mass.

Let me repeat, they have mass.

That means they must move slower than light always.

I will buy this as soon as I buy a perpetual motion machine. The most likely explanation is some form of systematic error on the part of the Italians.

Physics is different in Italy. They don't have gravity:

Image: hot-italian-girl.jpg

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:29:07pm

re: #2 LudwigVanQuixote

First off, neutrinos have mass.

Let me repeat, they have mass.

That means they must move slower than light always.

I will buy this as soon as I buy a perpetual motion machine. The most likely explanation is some form of systematic error on the part of the Italians.

I wonder (as a layman) whether what really happened here, assuming that c is truly a constant and cannot be exceeded by any particle with mass, is that a new particle has been discovered. As I understand it, evaluating the data provided by any of CERN's colliders/accelerators is highly technical, and I note that Ereditato has failed - in any of the articles I have read - to mention the degree of certainty they have been able to ascribe to this event.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:29:33pm

re: #5 imp_62

Right. It is also very important to note that the Neutrino itself was predicted by Fermi using the theory of relativity that it is now supposedly violating.

It is not clear to me what could possibly be special about these neutrinos from CERN that could make them behave differently than other neutrinos. On the off chance that this is a correct finding and not some form of systematic error or failure of the analysis, then the question becomes what happened at CERN that was special for these neutrinos. However I really am not holding my breath for it all to go in that direction.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:31:41pm

re: #6 Decatur Deb

Physics is different in Italy. They don't have gravity:

Image: hot-italian-girl.jpg

Wow... well I can understand how the Italian team in question might have become distracted then. I forgive them any errors!

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:38:05pm

Let's have a pool on what went wrong.
My entries:
1. Failure to adjust for movement in the Earth's crust in changing the distance traveled in the accelerator. I know that CERN has made these adjustments a part of their analyses, but perhaps recent quakes/eruptions have mucked up their variables.
2. Failure to adjust for recent changes to the Earth's spin resulting from earthquakes.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:43:03pm

re: #7 imp_62

I wonder (as a layman) whether what really happened here,

Most likely there was a subtle systematic error in the measurements. Those things can be hard to find. You can rest assured that the physics community at large will go over this with a very fine comb.

assuming that c is truly a constant and cannot be exceeded by any particle with mass,

Well all the analysis of all the other particles at CERN, and all the predictions made and verified at CERN assume that to be true and could not be true if it were not.

is that a new particle has been discovered. As I understand it, evaluating the data provided by any of CERN's colliders/accelerators is highly technical, and I note that Ereditato has failed - in any of the articles I have read - to mention the degree of certainty they have been able to ascribe to this event.

Well, he is spokesman for one group at a very large collaboration. He does not represent all of OPERA I believe.

Nature

has a good point about this:

[Link: www.nature.com...]

Most troubling for OPERA is a separate analysis of a pulse of neutrinos from a nearby supernova known as 1987a. If the speeds seen by OPERA were achievable by all neutrinos, then the pulse from the supernova would have shown up years earlier than the exploding star's flash of light; instead, they arrived within hours of each other. "It's difficult to reconcile with what OPERA is seeing,"

I will certainly read their paper once they have it up on Archiv X.

In science, this is a really big gamble. The people at OPERA are certainly certain enough about this to make noise. Going to the press before publishing is always a bad sign though. If they are right, yes this would be giant news of the sort to make a legendary career. They clearly want there to be no confusion with their names if that happens.

Of course, if and when, as is most likely, this turns out to be a systematic error, their names will be attached without any chance of confusion.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 1:43:49pm

re: #10 imp_62

Let's have a pool on what went wrong.
My entries:
1. Failure to adjust for movement in the Earth's crust in changing the distance traveled in the accelerator. I know that CERN has made these adjustments a part of their analyses, but perhaps recent quakes/eruptions have mucked up their variables.
2. Failure to adjust for recent changes to the Earth's spin resulting from earthquakes.

Or how about it is just bloody hard to measure a run of over 120 KM through mountains down to a sub cm scale.

dragonfire1981 Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:02:47pm

Prepare for Warp Speed, Mr. Scott!

(sorry, I had to)

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:03:58pm

re: #13 dragonfire1981

Prepare for Warp Speed, Mr. Scott!

(sorry, I had to)

Not to be too geeky, but warp speed is hypothetically possible without violating the Theory of Special Relativity!

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:18:25pm

re: #14 imp_62

Not to be too geeky, but warp speed is hypothetically possible without violating the Theory of Special Relativity!

And how is that? Seriously... I've never seen a definition of warp drive so I am curious.

Dancing along the light of day Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:25:15pm

re: #13 dragonfire1981

Beam me up, Scotty!
Yes, well...

goddamnedfrank Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:28:33pm

re: #12 LudwigVanQuixote

Or how about it is just bloody hard to measure a run of over 120 KM through mountains down to a sub cm scale.

The article says the neutrino beam passes through water, air and rock. Neutrinos aren't photons and don't easily intereract but they do experience something like refraction through the MSW effect right? What I'm wondering is how they actually measure the distance traveled vs. light when they can't bend photons via the same mechanism? I guess they could run fiber optics through the same path, but I don't think they do because that would present other huge calibration and engineering challenges.

mr.fusion Thu, Sep 22, 2011 2:47:10pm

I read an article a day or two ago (for the life of me I can't find it) that was explaining that eventually the universe, because it's rate of expansion is increasing, will eventually surpass the speed of light.

The article concluded that because it was the expansion of the universe, and not objects in the universe that passed the speed of light that Einsteins law would still hold true. Still, that shows that moving faster than the speed of light is possible.

But I've always wondered......if light can't escape the gravity of a black hole, wouldn't that mean the force of gravity is more powerful than the speed of light? I mean I know next to nothing about astro-physics, but I wouldn't be all that surprised if we find out there are exceptions to the rules

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 3:25:30pm

re: #17 goddamnedfrank

Well no one is really bending a neutrino beam. Think of it more as pointing at a neutrino source.

shutdown Thu, Sep 22, 2011 3:27:34pm

re: #15 LudwigVanQuixote

And how is that? Seriously... I've never seen a definition of warp drive so I am curious.

I think this is the article I first read on the topic. IIRC, I saw it in print, but not sure which publication.

Warp Hypothetically Possible

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 3:27:47pm

re: #17 goddamnedfrank

Also the MSW effect has a lot more to do with electron densities than anything else. I am not sure what you are driving at.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 3:32:07pm

re: #18 mr.fusion

I read an article a day or two ago (for the life of me I can't find it) that was explaining that eventually the universe, because it's rate of expansion is increasing, will eventually surpass the speed of light.

This is not correct. The expansion of the universe can be thought of as the universe adding extra space. As of now, there is no reason to believe that the electromagnetic field - and hence the speed of light would change at all. The space interacts with the field the same way. We can look backwards in time at the spectra of distant stars and be very confident that the universe had the same speed of light when it was much smaller than it is now.

The article concluded that because it was the expansion of the universe, and not objects in the universe that passed the speed of light that Einsteins law would still hold true. Still, that shows that moving faster than the speed of light is possible.

Yeah not really so true.

But I've always wondered...if light can't escape the gravity of a black hole, wouldn't that mean the force of gravity is more powerful than the speed of light?

In essence yes. It means that escape velocity for the black hole is greater than the speed of light.

I mean I know next to nothing about astro-physics, but I wouldn't be all that surprised if we find out there are exceptions to the rules

Yes, but exceptions to the rules in physics still abide by the rules.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 3:41:17pm

re: #20 imp_62

I think this is the article I first read on the topic. IIRC, I saw it in print, but not sure which publication.

Warp Hypothetically Possible

Yeah this is the stuff where strings might hold something that could do it. Notice the very strong emphasis on might.

goddamnedfrank Thu, Sep 22, 2011 4:12:05pm

re: #19 LudwigVanQuixote

Well no one is really bending a neutrino beam. Think of it more as pointing at a neutrino source.

I see. I wasn't reading closely, thought the detector was part of the CERN ring. The detector are in Italy, far away from the source in CERN. So unless they dig a tunnel the entire straight line length of the throw there's no way to directly race neutrinos vs. photons over the same distance?

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 4:20:11pm

re: #24 goddamnedfrank

I see. I wasn't reading closely, thought the detector was part of the CERN ring. The detector are in Italy, far away from the source in CERN. So unless they dig a tunnel the entire straight line length of the throw there's no way to directly race neutrinos vs. photons over the same distance?

Absolutely. It will come down to some sort of a correlations between events at OPERA and events at CERN that they believe made the neutrinos in question in the first place and a really good measure of the distance between the two sites.

There is all sorts of room in there to be off by 20 nanoseconds. If the way they do their counting is in anyway delayed, the time issue could come from the electronics itself.

Now maybe, just maybe they are not off, there is not a hidden bias in the equipment, mis-measurement or other systematic error. Maybe...but, I would not bet on it and most likely, all the hype in the long run is only going to add the the media misrepresentation that science is something vastly more malleable than it is.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 4:21:58pm

re: #24 goddamnedfrank

And by maybe I mean epsilon.

RadicalModerate Thu, Sep 22, 2011 5:00:10pm

re: #20 imp_62

I think this is the article I first read on the topic. IIRC, I saw it in print, but not sure which publication.

Warp Hypothetically Possible

Hypothetically possible, yes - even to the point that it can be done without completely obliterating the spaceship and its contents. The mathematics supports this as potentially feasible.
Currently, the biggest roadblock is the amount of energy required to warp a bubble of 3-D space/time to facilitate the travel.

Think on the scale of the energy output of a star.

eightyfiv Thu, Sep 22, 2011 5:11:44pm

re: #18 mr.fusion

Put another way, in relativity, only measurements made at the same place and the same time are directly comparable. (To be pedantic, this applies only to quantities that have a direction, and not scalars like mass.) To compare measurements made in different places and times, you have to mathematically drag the measurements side-by-side until they're coincident and then you can compare them, and this can produce strange results.

It's a similar phenomenon to how, on the surface of the earth, directions seem to have a universal meaning, that north is "north" wherever you are, but you can do a little experiment to show that directions are only directly comparable if you stay in one place. Start on the equator, walk north until you reach the pole, and draw a little arrow to indicate which way was "north" when you came. Then, go back to the equator, point your left hand in the direction you came from (so you don't have to rely on your compass), walk straight east for a while, and then head in the direction your left hand is pointing. It will still be "north", and you'll still make it to the pole, but you'll be heading a different direction than you came from last. So you took two different paths from your starting point to the pole, and depending on which path you followed, the direction arrow you carefully carried with you (your left hand) ended up pointing a different direction, even though you never rotated it! This shows that in curved space, vectors are not objectively comparable unless they are coincident.

In relativity, space-time is curved, so similar considerations apply. A distant object may seem like it's traveling faster than the speed of light, but if you actually go over there to measure its speed (if you can get there at all -- that's another issue), you'll never be able to show it moving as fast as you thought.

There is actually a sizeable collection of "loopholes" that allow apparent faster-than-light phenomena even in the absence of weird space-time (see EPR paradox and Bell's Inequality on quantum entanglement, transit times for scattering through a Bose-Einstein condensate, or the more prosaic effect of twirling a flashlight really fast and measuring the speed of the light patch on a far away wall), but they all have some deep subtlety that make them utterly unlike the simple experiment of measuring the relative velocity of two coincident particles. In no such case can any information be transmitted faster than light by the effect.

It seems like it would be possible to transmit information faster than light according to the claims outlined here, which makes them sound all the more outlandish. Needless to say, if that were possible, you'd be only a hop, skip, and a jump away from being able to send messages backward in time.

mr.fusion Thu, Sep 22, 2011 6:39:14pm

re: #22 LudwigVanQuixote

re: #28 eightyfiv

I know we're down in the basement now so I'm not sure if you guys will see this

But just wanted to say thanks for the detailed response to what was probably a pretty ignorant post.

Very interesting stuff.......wish I was 18 again and could go back and get into theoretical physics or astro biology or something like that......just fascinating stuff

Thanks again

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 6:51:01pm

re: #29 mr.fusion

You are very welcome.

Mad Prophet Ludwig Thu, Sep 22, 2011 7:43:49pm

New page:

How to know when to see a red flag in Science.

(I Stand By What I Said Whatever It Was) Thu, Sep 22, 2011 9:52:02pm

$5 on quantum shenanigans.

wheat-dogghazi Thu, Sep 22, 2011 11:33:33pm

re: #6 Decatur Deb

I think she's got some support there. But I'll volunteer to investigate this phenomenon and get back to you on it.

(I Stand By What I Said Whatever It Was) Fri, Sep 23, 2011 12:27:24am

This is hilarious:

#mundaneneutrinoexplanations on Twitter

NVAudiophile Fri, Sep 23, 2011 6:46:34am

re: #13 dragonfire1981

I cann-a change the law-o-physics captain!

Achilles Tang Fri, Sep 23, 2011 9:11:37am

re: #28 eightyfiv

or the more prosaic effect of twirling a flashlight really fast and measuring the speed of the light patch on a far away wall

but that is not actually any movement of photons faster than light, nor is it information passed from the beam starting point on the wall to where it moved "faster than light", is it?

Achilles Tang Fri, Sep 23, 2011 9:22:39am

re: #25 LudwigVanQuixote

Now maybe, just maybe they are not off, there is not a hidden bias in the equipment, mis-measurement or other systematic error. Maybe...but, I would not bet on it and most likely, all the hype in the long run is only going to add the the media misrepresentation that science is something vastly more malleable than it is.

I understand that there are strange things in QED, like buckyballs behaving like photons in the standard double slit experiment, that photons can be brought to rest, or close to it, and that according to Feynman (I think) some photons in effect have their alter egos travel paths that have to be faster than light, before they cancel out at a target, not to mention entanglement which is FTL of information, if not energy.

This was all considered crap (even by Einstein) until clearly proven; so that some flavor of neutrino might break another common rule, under some circumstances, might not be that far fetched in comparison.

But, as you say, we will see in due course.

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