• Neutrino experiment repeated at Cern - Finds same result
    68 replies, posted
[QUOTE=DarkendSky;33338698]I don't claim to be much of a physicist, let alone a particle physicist, but if matter cannot exceed the speed of light because its mass approaches infinity, thus requiring infinite energy (which is impossible), can a particle that does not have mass in the first place exceed the speed of light? Electrons have ~1/2000 the mass of a proton, and always move at nearly the speed of light. Photons have no mass, and move at the speed of light (since they are light). Does this mean neutrinos have negative mass? Or are they a energy particle like photons that simply have less potential mass? Do they just move faster than light by some unexplained principle?[/QUOTE] If neutrinos are found to move faster than light they would have to be intrinsically massless, but to move faster than photons, would need more energy to exceed light-speed
Neutrinos have mass.
The experiment having this result is the choice of Steins;Gate. Get your Dr. Pepper ready.
[QUOTE=_Maverick_;33327865]me, not being the sciencey type.. i don't quite understand what this means IF it is proved true yes, i understand about the whole "nothing is faster than light" and while this is quite intresting, what could we do with this if this indeed is fact?[/QUOTE] If it is proved true, Special and General Relativity are not correct in every scope. This is already a big bummer. What concerns me more are Maxwell's Equations and every theory relying on them. A lot of work which has been done in the past might be overall false. That's why it's so exciting to watch this mystery getting solved. [editline]20th November 2011[/editline] [QUOTE=Overv;33328466]This doesn't really mean anything. Science is all about experiments being reproducible, in this case the same team of scientists repeated the experiment. Sure they proved that a few of the possible mistakes couldn't have happened, but we need an independent investigation before we can conclude anything at all.[/QUOTE] They just try to decrease every possible error. a separate experiment on the other hand is, as you already mentioned, required. If I remember correctly, there was one already (was it in conunction with fermilab?) with similar results but too big statistical errors to call it significant. And I'm sure, there will be another one soon, e.g. in Japan (Super Kamiokande) or somewhere else. [editline]20th November 2011[/editline] [QUOTE=Waterpi;33328395]Read up about this a while ago. Researched a bit on the subject and found the answer in Neutrino oscillation. This is a known fact and basically involves the changing of a Neutrinos "flavor" over macro distances. This happens because the different flavors have different masses, and so after a while, the lightest flavor will arrive first, be measured, the next flavor will then arrive and change the state of the Neutrino, turning it into a different flavor etc. If Neutrinos are found to be able to oscillate without mass, relativity is saved.[/QUOTE] With or without mass, they should keep below the speed of light.
they didnt repeat the same experiment, they simply re-calculated it. The title is a lie. it could still be an error with the data itself. get your damn facts right.
[QUOTE=Mattk50;33354612]they didnt repeat the same experiment, they simply re-calculated it. The title is a lie. it could still be an error with the data itself. get your damn facts right.[/QUOTE] Really? [quote]Initial analysis of the work by the wider scientific community argued that the relatively long bunches of neutrinos could introduce a significant error into the measurement. Those bunches lasted 10 millionths of a second - 160 times longer than the discrepancy the team initially reported in the neutrinos' travel time. To address that, scientists at Cern adjusted the way in which the proton beams were produced, resulting in bunches just three billionths of a second long, so the Opera collaboration could repeat the measurements.[/quote] I'm not sure how they can change the length of bunches by manipulating data.
[QUOTE]With or without mass, they should keep below the speed of light.[/QUOTE] Not necessarily, particles without invariant mass must always move at the speed of light (to distinguish these particles from bradyons and tachyons, they're called luxons). I'm not sure how they're able to move faster though (possibly because of a total relativistic mass of zero, though I'm not entirely certain).
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/hYoiZ.png[/IMG]
Scientific theories are neither true or false. They are approximations to predict the outcome of an experiment (how ever large this experiment may be). The theory of relativity is a very good approximation of the motion of objects and time, but is still nothing more than an approximation. It says nothing about the mechanics behind relativity, why relativity is the way it is. To find that out we need to dig deeper into the workings of reality. Maybe we will find out that the reason that relativity is the way it is, in the same way that we found out why the periodic table of elements is the way it is, allows for things to happen that seem to defy relativity, in the same way that the periodic table of elements can be defied by using anti-muon particles instead of protons.
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