Groundbreaking Technique Yields Important New Details on Silicon, Subatomic Particles and Possible 'Fifth Force' (nist.gov) 81
NIST: Using a groundbreaking new technique at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an international collaboration led by NIST researchers has revealed previously unrecognized properties of technologically crucial silicon crystals and uncovered new information about an important subatomic particle and a long-theorized fifth force of nature. By aiming subatomic particles known as neutrons at silicon crystals and monitoring the outcome with exquisite sensitivity, the NIST scientists were able to obtain three extraordinary results: the first measurement of a key neutron property in 20 years using a unique method; the highest-precision measurements of the effects of heat-related vibrations in a silicon crystal; and limits on the strength of a possible "fifth force" beyond standard physics theories.
In a regular crystal such as silicon, there are many parallel sheets of atoms, each of which forms a plane. Probing different planes with neutrons reveals different aspects of the crystal. The researchers report their findings in the journal Science. To obtain information about crystalline materials at the atomic scale, scientists typically aim a beam of particles (such as X-rays, electrons or neutrons) at the crystal and detect the beam's angles, intensities and patterns as it passes through or ricochets off planes in the crystal's lattice-like atomic geometry. That information is critically important for characterizing the electronic, mechanical and magnetic properties of microchip components and various novel nanomaterials for next-generation applications including quantum computing. A great deal is known already, but continued progress requires increasingly detailed knowledge.
In a regular crystal such as silicon, there are many parallel sheets of atoms, each of which forms a plane. Probing different planes with neutrons reveals different aspects of the crystal. The researchers report their findings in the journal Science. To obtain information about crystalline materials at the atomic scale, scientists typically aim a beam of particles (such as X-rays, electrons or neutrons) at the crystal and detect the beam's angles, intensities and patterns as it passes through or ricochets off planes in the crystal's lattice-like atomic geometry. That information is critically important for characterizing the electronic, mechanical and magnetic properties of microchip components and various novel nanomaterials for next-generation applications including quantum computing. A great deal is known already, but continued progress requires increasingly detailed knowledge.
Science Nerds Laws of Disappointment (Score:5, Funny)
1. It's not aliens.
2. There is no fifth force, and if there is, it's not going to give you anti-gravity or anything cool.
3. Faster than light travel is impossible.
Re:Science Nerds Laws of Disappointment (Score:5, Funny)
Scientists still haven't discovered the ruins on the moon.
The fuck?
Are you an honest-to-god quack? On slashdot? Fascinating.
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Scientists still haven't discovered the ruins on the moon.
The fuck?
Are you an honest-to-god quack? On slashdot? Fascinating.
I was going to invoke Poe's Law but then he responded a second time. It looks like you're entirely correct. We have an honest-to-FSM quack on our hands. Who knew? It's like discovering an endangered mammal that hasn't been seen in 50 years isn't extinct after all.
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Somehow you deserve to get your science from Hulu.
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/whoosh
Here is the ELI5 just for you:
1. Other than Earth the closest Earth-like planet, Proxima Centauri b, is ~4.2 light years away.
2. While there is a singularity when v = c, there is nothing in Einstein's math [space.com] that prevents v > c. We still don't understand the physical implications of the square root of a negative number. In Electrical Engineering they use imaginary numbers to denotate phase. We don't (yet) have an analog for velocity.
3. We have multiple eye witnesses of first hand alien contact sp
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Well, m = g * pi/2 / a, so your IQ must be below 100.
Which shows that not just you can use random formulas without reference or explanations to bolster your factless opinions.
Good point made?
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3. It just makes more sense to me that the VZ-9 and other odd shaped military test vehicles were those seen for decades. Looking at Roswell crash photos with modern eyes it's pretty obvious that's a stealth aircraft prototype built with earth tech. If you happened to hang around Area 51 30 years ago while they tested these craft at night and watched it approach the experience would be identical to many UFO stories where they hover silently then suddenly zip away at impossible speeds. It's simply a quiet ste
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It's fundamental human nature, and it's well known in any field that relies on eye witnesses.
The human brain is not an objective observer.
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2. While there is a singularity when v = c, there is nothing in Einstein's math [space.com] that prevents v > c. We still don't understand the physical implications of the square root of a negative number. In Electrical Engineering they use imaginary numbers to denotate phase. We don't (yet) have an analog for velocity.
You're right that there are solutions to SR when v > c.
However, that's ignoring the meaning of c.
c isn't the speed of light. Light goes c, but that's because light has no mass.
Noting that the math says it's possible for v to be > than c, while ignoring the consequences of c not being v(max) is silly.
3. We have multiple eye witnesses of first hand alien contact spanning decades using aerial vehicles without wings or any other known systems for flight -- which you would know if took your head out of the sand long enough to notice the evidence.
We have eye witness accounts of sasquatch and ghosts too, and don't get me started on the amount of people who hear God.
4. You honestly think an alien species is going to waste their time travelling at sub-light speed to come sight see on Earth???
You honestly believe an alien species is going to use up stellar bodies worth of m
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Please, tell us how your crazy uncle Frank travelled to the moon and found ruins there without the help of scientists. It's bound to be one of the more fascinating delusions ever posted on this site, so we all want to hear the story.
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Because a story is "proof". /s
After you die you can go there first hand and confirm it -- that is the only valid proof.
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4. Pluto isn't a planet.
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That's a matter of definition, not of fact. Whether it's a planet or not depends on what definition you use. Similarly for Vesta and Ceres. And Ganymede. All have at one time fitted the currently used definition, and then at another time they didn't. Whether Pluto is a planet or not will depend on whether the IAU is allowed to rule what the definition is. I see no reason they should be allowed to do so, except in their own journals. But if you want to yield to them the right to define terms in common
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As it became apparent that it was a shitty little ice ball, it became very clear it didn't even fit contemporary definitions of "planet" at the time it was discovered.
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The only "fact" of the matter is whether the definition is appropriately applied. We made the definitions, we can change them, science tends to do this sporadically but it does do it. Take it up with the Intergalactic Definitional Authority.
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First test for a new definition is that it must successfully categorize the existing planets.
Complete nonsense.
Brain numbingly fucking stupid complete nonsense.
By that reasoning, mistakes were made when we re-defined gravity to be a consequence of the curvature of spacetime instead of an actual force.
Anything else only serves to invalidate previously validated work containing the term.
If the previous validation is known to be invalid, then you fix it.
What is the point of going to so much effort to insure published work is valid if someone is going to change the meanings of the words after the fact to something which is no longer valid?
You're right, people should not do anything, because in the future, people might know a bit more than you do.
For that matter how can anyone cite past work going forward if we've effectively introduced a unit conversion error into the process? The new definition failed this basic test. Rejected.
Totally. That's why maxwell's equations are bum now. After all, they weren't formulated in minkowski space.
Pluto wasn't ev
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we re-defined gravity to be a consequence of the curvature of spacetime instead of an actual force.
There is no difference in curvature of space-time and being an actual force.
And I consider Pluto a planet. How you treat him, is up to you. Just do not call your dog Pluto.
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There is no difference in curvature of space-time and being an actual force.
Incorrect. There is, which is why gravity is a pseudo-force.
See: coriolis force, centrifugal force. These are not fundamental forces, they are consequences of your inertial motion.
You are not being pulled toward the planet, your world-line is simply pointed in that direction. You can point it away from the planet, but if you don't have enough velocity, you're simply going to curve right back toward it.
Now if you're trying to argue that the equivalence principle means that "gravity is indistinguishable f
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Now if you're trying to argue that the equivalence principle means that "gravity is indistinguishable from a force in non-relativistic regimes" then, no argument there.
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Incorrect. There is, which is why gravity is a pseudo-force. :D
It is not
Easy to figure if you want to calculate an orbit, e.g. around the moon, with curvation of space time only: good luck.
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It is not :D
What the fuck?
Are you literally arguing with me about Einstein's cornerstone conclusion of General Relativity? That gravity is a fictitious force?
Easy to figure if you want to calculate an orbit, e.g. around the moon, with curvation of space time only: good luck.
What are you talking about here? I'm pretty sure your English is failing you again.
Newtonian gravity is a good enough approximation of what gravity really is for calculation of orbits.
However, Newtonian gravity is provably wrong. General Relativity has yet to be proven wrong, in spite of over a century of trying.
That means, as far as current scientific knowled
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Brain numbingly fucking stupid complete nonsense."
Thank you for providing a summary of your comment before I made the mistake of reading the rest.
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Thank you. I don't mean to pat myself on the back but acknowledging that artificially reducing the planet count by retroactively altering an existing definition rather than defining
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That planets and dwarf planets have different definitions. It was an odd compromise to make the new category 'dwarf planet' when Pluto and its 10 other similar objects were declassified as planets.
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Fuck any definition of "planet" that is anything else than the literal "body revolving around the sun".
Pluto can happily be a "microplanet". A subset of "planet". And human made-sattelites (including human-made humans), that revolve around the sun (and not e.g. around Earth) are planets too.
Calling it "not a planet" is a key sign of the growing amount of batshit pseudo-scientists in the ranks of science. The exact kind that is bred by our "bulemic rote memorization" educational system, where nobody cares if
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Re: Science Nerds Laws of Disappointment (Score:2)
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Salvation for SW! (Score:1)
Just to be clear... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Just to be clear... (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, they are only talking about a specific speculated type of fifth force called the Yukawa force, there may be other types of forces yet undiscovered that we have no idea of even how to put constraints on.
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If they're completely undiscovered, at this point, it hints that they don't exist. Much like dark matter, really, it explains some theoretical observations but conflicts with so many that that it would have to be extraordinary not to have been detected and probably does not exist.
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Meh, and about a century ago, physisists thought there are only a couple open questions to settle and then they're done. And before that, it was theorized that the atom is the elementary unit of matter. If it's undiscovered, it means just that. Either the theory behind it is nonsense, or we need to look closer. Everything else is speculation for the coffee table.
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A profound new unsisght, like discovering a fifth force, would open very large new fields. It needn't even mean the previous theory was nonsense, merely that it needs refinement. Atoms as a fundamental particle is still a potent theory and used extensively in chemistry and physics. It's merely incomplete.
Re:Just to be clear... (Score:4, Informative)
So you really have read nothing at all about dark matter it seems. Dark matter definitely exists, we observed its effects as long ago as 1933, and its gravitational effects are now seen in at least eleven different classes of evidence, here is a very easy to find and read summary [wikipedia.org]. Your reference to "theoretical observations" is bizarre. Observations are actual things, not theories.
It is as observable as anything else that must be detected through how its gravitational effects act on other things like light and visible matter. Black holes for example (more on this in a second). We see it bending light, creating lenses, many physical systems in the Universe are now known that do not have enough detectable matter to hold them together (like... every galaxy in the Universe), and all attempts to explain it away with ad hoc modifications of existing theories (MOND, etc.) fail to explain away dark matter (in addition to being kludges) since they only apply to one or two of the many categories of evidence and still require invisible matter for the rest.
One of the remaining candidates for dark matter BTW are are black holes. Only black holes in a particular range of masses (10^17 to 10^21 grams) can be responsible and we don't have any accepted explanation yet of a process that could form so many in this specific size range. But super-symmetry theorists have models that do this, so perhaps this is where super-symmetry gets experimental confirmation.
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Yes, I have read it. We've observed gravitational effects, and our assumptions about the gravitational expansion of the universe, the the Hubble constant, and the surprisingly low expansion velocities at the furthest edges of the universe are complex conclusions based on conclusions about the luminosity of objects billions of years old, extrapolated from what can be measured more nearby. It's based on an astonishing stack of theoretical rather than measured conclusions about the amount of matter in the univ
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From your literal linked wikipedia article:
"Many experiments to directly detect and study dark matter particles are being actively undertaken, but none have yet succeeded."
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Actually in the 4th element, the 4 elements are not synonymous with what we call elements. For instance, air is not an element, and is much more synonymous with a force. Fire is not an element, it's a chemical reaction. Earth is not a specific element either and is likely again a reference to gravity else why wouldn't they just call it "dirt". Water is likely a reference to states of matter, because H2O can be gaseous thus in the air, and solid thus ice.
Since the 4 elements is a reference to Greek society,
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Aristotle disagrees with you:
An element, we take it, is a body into which other bodies may be analysed, present in them potentially or in actuality (which of these, is still disputable), and not itself divisible into bodies different in form. That, or something like it, is what all men in every case mean by element.
He further characterized the four classical elements as being hot or cold, and wet or dry. Other classical writings also emphasize that what we see in the world (although Aristotle differed on the composition of stars) is composed of various combinations of those four elements.
"Like seeking like" is a trait or behavior, not an indication that the substance itself is some kind of action. In contrast, the five traditional Chinese "elements" were seen as much more dynamic and mut
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A better translation is "principle" - or if you want to touch some "magic" on it: aspect.
Problem about such language barriers is, there are simply words in one language that do not exist in the other one.
There are thesauri that list words from one point of the spectrum via a chain of synonyms to the antonym (forgot how that is called). Even in related languages like English and German, it happens that the terms of one language are basically in between the terms of the other one.
Why do I prefer principle/asp
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What you said seems fair.
The point about "like seeking like" is a lack of understanding the properties of matter, to a degree that we can argue they are inseparable. Without being able to distinguish these characteristics, the forces are assumed but unexplained. This is the root of my arguement.
no motion is possible without force acting on the moving object
The activity of lightness consists in the light thing being in a certain place, namely high up: when it is in the contrary place, it is being prevented. The case is similar also in regard to quantity and quality. Bu
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Slashdot is hardly the “nerd Mecca”.
Crank Mecca, maybe.
bad reporting (Score:2, Informative)
Bad reporting is not a fifth force.
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It's moved more discussions than any other.
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For the better?
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Bad editing is not News for Nerds.
Ah, wait.
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> Bad reporting is not a fifth force.
Fake news sure seems like a potent force to me.
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Apparently not very forceful on me.
Moore's law continues (Score:1)
Where's the NSA in this (Score:1, Interesting)
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"Since NIST appears to exist as a front for domestic NSA spying" How so or are you just running off at the fingers?
Duh,I found a lack that a 7th force does not exist (Score:1)
regardless that someone tells me he is my father.
I've heard this before... (Score:2)
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Don't forget to reverse the polarity
Oi Veh That's setting a limit on a fifth force (Score:5, Insightful)
Not finding it. The experiment sets limits on a possible fifth force, it's more accurate to say we are that much closer to completely ruling it out
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No, article conclusively proves there is a fifth force, that of misleading bullshit headlines. Never underestimate their reach, production rate or power!
Non-paywalled preprint (Score:5, Informative)
...is probably this one. [arxiv.org].
Re: Non-paywalled preprint (Score:3)
Also please somebody correcy me if I'm wrong, but this has nothing to do with a 5-th force except for the usual "we looked more carefully than anyone else and still haven't found it" a.k.a. "we narrowed down the range in which it might exist.
Not to diminish the rest if their experimental success, it's probably pretty impressive (not my house discipline, but it's published in Science, so it must be cool :-) Besides: measuring charge distribution of neutrons admittedly does sound like "waterboarding and other
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Comparing apples and oranges doesn't make you insightful.
Re: Non-paywalled preprint (Score:2)
The german word for "orange" is "Apfelsine", which literally translates to "Chinese apple" in an archaic form of the language.
So, yes, depending on the purpose, comparing apples and oranges is a valid move.
And I don't give a rat's anus about being "insightful". If you have something constructive to contribute, I'm all ears.
Ridiculous misleading headline. (Score:3, Insightful)
Never has it been more obvious, that the /. editor did not even actually read what he quoted there.
But the headline states "possible fifth force".
NO. It means that even with their extraordinary sensitivity, they could not detect a fifth force. Which means there now is a very vey low upper limit to the strength of any such force, if it exists. Which means any fifth force now became much more unlikely! The exact opposite of what the headline suggests.
Putting limits on things is a standard method in research. You narrow it down and thereby exclude a lot of theories.
Same thing happened with the Higgs boson's mass and the various string and quantum gravity theories. (The now know mass excludes *all* string theories, by the way. Making them decidedly pseudo-science, like aether theory. But go tell that to its deciples...)
Re:Ridiculous misleading headline. (Score:5, Funny)
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Perhaps you should reread the article.
They are pretty convinced about a 5th force, and are trying to narrow it down, not to dimish it.
What was actually discovered? (Score:1)
I read TFS thrice. And all it says is that something was discovered. And partially how.
But not what, specifically, was discovered!
And everyone, including me, was too distracted by msmash getting that "fifth force" thing completely wrong.
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All msmash did was repeat what NIST said. How did he get anything wrong or are you just one of his secret admirers?
Possible "Fifth Force"? (Score:2)
They discovered The Schwartz?