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Proton collisions probe the final frontier of the standard model of particle physics

The nuclear forces that act on short-lived subatomic particles have been hard to study. This problem has now been solved by smashing high-energy protons together and measuring the momenta of the unstable particles produced.
  1. Manuel Lorenz

    1. Manuel Lorenz is at the Institute for Nuclear Physics, Goethe University, Frankfurt 60438, Germany.

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In a paper in Nature, the ALICE Collaboration1 reports that data from high-energy collisions between protons can be used to investigate the little-understood nuclear forces between protons and subatomic particles called hyperons. The measurements have comparable precision to state-of-the-art numerical calculations of the forces, thereby allowing conclusive quantitative comparisons of experimental data with theory. Accurate knowledge of these forces is needed for various aspects of physics research, for example in efforts to understand the stability of neutron stars.

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Nature 588, 222-223 (2020)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03393-z

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