Researchers are probing the behavior of extremely short-lived subatomic particles in the hope of finding clues to dark matter, an invisible substance whose presence is known through its gravitational effects on ordinary matter. In a high-energy collision experiment, they detected beauty quarks interacting with other particles at distances of about a billionth of a meter—scales where some theories suggest dark matter could influence how particles behave and decay.
Dark matter is thought to make up a large part of the universe, but scientists have not yet detected it directly. Its existence is inferred from the way its gravity affects ordinary matter; in every other respect, it remains invisible.
To search for possible signs of it, researchers collided particles at high energy and studied the material ejected in the collisions. Among the particles produced was the beauty quark, a subatomic particle smaller than an atom.
Beauty quarks are unstable and exist for only 1.5 trillionths of a second before breaking down, or decaying, into other forms. Despite this brief lifetime, the researchers detected them interacting with other small particles at a scale of a billionth of a meter.
Looking for dark matter at tiny scales
Some theories suggest that particles may be more sensitive to dark matter at these scales. Dark matter could affect how quarks interact and decay, meaning that activity in this extremely small realm could provide a way to detect it.
“We are knocking on the door of this Zeptverse,” Dr Harry Cliffe from the University of Cambridge, who led the data analysis, told BBC News.
He said that this subatomic “dance” gives researchers a ringside view of potential new particle behavior.
“And what we want to do now is go out there and explore and find new particles waiting there. And to do that, we need more data,” Cliff added.
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
