3.31.2006
ouch.
From the Vancouver Sun:
"And while the physics world has been buzzing since Thursday's announcement of the latest anti-matter find, outsiders have barely noticed.
Why?
The experiment illustrates the difficulty in publicizing work in this abstract world of concepts unknown to most people -- quarks, muons, particle accelerators, and anti-matter itself.
The finding at Fermilab, a U.S. federal physics laboratory, is never going to affect your daily life. Fermilab found a particle called a 'B-sub-s meson.' You won't ever buy an iPod made of B-sub-s mesons. And Fermilab's announcement was pure gobbledygook, which didn't help."
Daaaammmn. You can read the gobbledygook in the Fermilab press release, and judge its gobbledygookyness. Does it make any sense to you?
Speaking of Fermilab, the newest experiment there is one that sends a beam of neutrinos through the earth to a detector in Minnesota. The photo below is the Minnesota site, when it was still under construction.
They just released their first result yesterday, showing that the neutrinos were changing type while travelling along through the earth. (Here's another Fermi press release.) Both of these results have to do with quantum mechanics -- with particles changing from one to another. This description of neutrino oscillation is a pretty good one (if not very in-depth) if you are interested in learning more. It's about a similar experiment in Japan. (Sorry for the Comic Sans, font-aficionados.)
In case you were wondering:
Current Location: Chicago
Happily Drinking Coffee from: Intelligentsia
Eagerly awaiting: Axl Rose's new Album
(thanks Alex)
: 9:33 AM << Home
