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‘The standard model is not dead’: ultra-precise particle measurement thrills physicists

CERN’s calculation of the W boson’s mass agrees with theory, contradicting a previous anomaly that had raised the possibility of new physics.
  1. Elizabeth Gibney
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A view of the CMS detector, part of the CERN LHC experiment, 4 in Geneva, Switzerland.

The CMS detector at CERN measured the decays of proton–proton collisions. Credit: Harold Cunningham/Getty

Physicists have nailed a fiendishly difficult measurement — the mass of the fundamental particle the W boson. The result, from the CMS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), is in line with the predictions of the standard model of particle physics, and pours cold water on an anomaly in the W boson mass that surfaced in 2022. That measurement had hinted at the existence of phenomena beyond the standard model, physicists’ best description of particles and forces.

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Nature 633, 745-746 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-03042-9

References

  1. Aaltonen, T. et al. Science 376, 170–176 (2022).

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