The X17 Particle and a Fifth Force of Nature

There have been some very surprising headlines out this week about an experimental confirmation of the detection of a new type of boson (force carrier) that seems to be associated with a fifth force. This could be a gigantic discovery with far-reaching implications, so it's prudent to be cautious before embracing this discovery just yet. But after the first detection of the X17 particle, reported in 2016, it seems that nobody has found any flaws in the experiments or the associated analysis, and now the same team of Hungarian particle physicists are reporting another detection of this particle under different conditions - so it's starting to look pretty exciting.

We're going to spend the next couple of weeks reading the papers about this so we can record a Physics Frontiers episode about it, and I thought some of you might like to see them for yourselves, so here are the links:

"New evidence supporting the existence of the hypothetic X17 particle," Krasznahorkay et al., (undergoing peer review now), 2019
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1910.10459.pdf

"Observation of Anomalous Internal Pair Creation in 8Be: A Possible Indication of a Light, Neutral Boson," Krasznahorkay et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 2016
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1504.01527.pdf

"Protophobic Fifth Force Interpretation of the Observed Anomaly in 8Be Nuclear Transitions," Feng et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 2016
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1604.07411

And here's one of the many mainstream news articles about this for additional background and context:

A 'no-brainer Nobel Prize': Hungarian scientists may have found a fifth force of nature - CNN
 

Shadowprophet

Truthiness
*Edited, As a useless post. before I found the information below.
 
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Shadowprophet

Truthiness
This Sheds some new light on the nature of dark matter, from I've found on it, It seems to center around how dark matter transitions with the physical universe. It's very interesting.

Scientists 'have found a FIFTH force of nature': Researchers claim to have observed energy that 'connects the visible world to dark matter'

  • Hungarian Academy of Sciences researchers' results could show fifth force work
  • They saw an excited, decaying helium atom emit light when the particles split
  • This came at a strange angle that could not be explained by current physics logic
  • Is second time Attila Krasznahorkay and his team seen new particle dubbed X17
Scientists claim they have observed a fifth force of nature that could transform our understanding of how the universe works. Researchers at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences have revealed results that could show it in action. They saw an excited, decaying helium atom emit light when the particles split in a strange way that could not be explained by the current understanding of physics.

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Hints of a fifth fundamental force have set the physics world abuzz. Researchers at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences have revealed results that could show it in action. The discovery could completely upend our understanding of the universe. Pictured is an image of the cosmic web

It was the second time lead scientist Attila Krasznahorkay and his team had seen the new particle they called X17.


They found its mass to be 17 megaelectronvolts. Mr. Krasznahorkay told CNN: 'X17 could be a particle, which connects our visible world with the dark matter.' Professor of physics and astronomy at the University of California, Irvine, Jonathan Feng, who has closely watched the Mr. Krasznahorkay's team's efforts, said it could be a 'game-changer', adding if it could be replicated, 'this would be a no-brainer Nobel Prize'. It comes three years after the Hungarian team spotted an anomaly in radioactive decay, suggesting the existence of a new particle. If their tests prove accurate, the discovery could completely upend our understanding of how the universe works.

The current working model of physics states that there are four fundamental forces of nature: gravity, electromagnetism, and the weak and strong forces between atoms. The 2016 experiment by Mr. Krasznahorkay and his team of physicists suggested there was another force. The team said at the time that they had found a bizarre radioactive decay irregularity, according to a report by nature news They published their results in late 2015 in the prestigious Physical Review Letters. Despite the radical claim, their paper received very little attention, according to a report in Gizmondo.

That is until physicists at the University of California checked their method and results – and found the study to be accurate. 'What it's telling us if it is correct is that there is something going on in the way that one particle talks to another particle that we haven't got inside our mathematics at the moment,' Geraint Lewis, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Sydney told ABC News at the time. Scientists have theorized that a fifth force exists for decades. They claim it could help explain the inability of the standard model of particle physics to explain dark matter. Dark matter is an invisible substance thought to make up more than 80 percent of the universe's mass. Theorists have proposed a number of exotic-matter particles, including 'dark photons', that carry the electromagnetic force. The Hungarian scientists were looking for dark photons by blasting protons at a thin strip of lithium. As the lithium absorbed the protons, it transformed into an unstable version of beryllium, which decayed even further, creating electrons and positrons.

When the protons hit against the lithium at 140 degrees, more electrons and positrons were created than were expected.
Krasznahorkay suggested this extra material was being created by a particle that was 34 times heavier than the electron. 'We are very confident about our experimental results,' said Krasznahorkay at the time, adding that the team had repeated its test several times.

But many scientists were skeptical of the claim.

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Physicists at the Institute for Nuclear Research in Debrecen, Hungary, said this apparatus — an electron-positron spectrometer — found evidence for a new particle.



Click here for more. Scientists 'have found a FIFTH force of nature' | Daily Mail Online
 
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