A black hole in a bath: Big physics on a bench-top - physics-math - 10 March 2014 - New Scientist

A black hole in a bath: Big physics on a bench-top - physics-math - 10 March 2014 - New Scientist

Supersymmetry...  One of its central predictions is that there should be more than one Higgs particle... they might have found some clue as to where those extra particles might be – in superfluid helium-3... The discovered Higgs weighs in at around 125 gigaelectronvolts (GeV). Studying the spectrum of excitations in the superfluid helium suggests Higgs particles should also exist at energies of 210 GeV and 325 GeV. These possibilities are not excluded by results collected so far at the LHC...

By concentrating laser light into a very small spot within a waveguide made of a glass block, he can temporarily change the refractive index of the glass so that it slows down subsequent laser pulses and ultimately repels them. "What makes these analogue experiments so powerful is that from a photon or a water wave's perspective, it has no way of distinguishing whether it is crossing the event horizon of a real black hole or is in a waveguide under some weird constraints," he says.

Higgs boson continues to be maddeningly well-behaved

Higgs boson continues to be maddeningly well-behaved: Today, experimentalists from CMS and the other main LHC detector ATLAS, armed with twice as much data as they had in July, told the Hadron Collider Physics symposium in Kyoto, Japan, that the number of tau particles detected has crept up. The new data can't yet rule out a deviation from the standard model but they do remove the main reason for thinking there was one in the first place...
...direct searches for new physics at the LHC have turned up empty too. Physicists presented searches for dozens of particles that would exist in a world governed by some of these new theories...
"The results really tell us that we're either not looking in the right place, or we're not looking in the right way, or maybe both..."

Researchers at SLAC find too many taus decay from bottom quarks to fit Standard Model

Researchers at SLAC find too many taus decay from bottom quarks to fit Standard Model: Instead of the 20% frequency rate predicted for D mesons, the researchers found a 31% rate (and a 25% rate for D* mesons instead of the predicted 23%)...

To explain the differences between the theories and observed results the researchers suggest that perhaps another Higgs Boson is at work; SUSY suggests there may be as many as four, though research at CERN is still ongoing to prove that what was observed earlier this year was in fact an actual Higgs.

Proof Found for Unifying Quantum Principle

Proof Found for Unifying Quantum Principle: His conjecture is called the a-theorem. It says that the number of ways in which quantum fields can be energetically excited (a) is always greater at high energies than at low energies...

Although lots of work has gone into relating short- and long-distance scales for particular quantum field theories, there are relatively few general principles that do this for all theories that can exist...
But Cardy's a-theorem could be one such principle. A version of it had already been proven in two dimensions, but Cardy proposed that it might hold in four dimensions--such as the three dimensions of space and one of time that exist in the space in which we live.

Could primordial black holes be dark matter?

Could primordial black holes be dark matter?: “A small, primordial black hole would be the size of an atom but have the mass of an asteroid,” he points out. “Its strong gravitational field, as it cut through the sun, would squeeze it, then release, and cause the sun to oscillate before ultimately settling down.”
The idea is to measure the oscillation, and determine what would cause it. “Shravan Hanasoge wrote a program to help us with a simulation to see what the sun would look like if a primordial black hole passed through. The smallest mass detectable is 10^21 grams,” Kesden continues.

Ultracold measurements reveal shape of the electron - physics-math - 25 May 2011 - New Scientist

Ultracold measurements reveal shape of the electron: They used ultracold molecules of ytterbium fluoride in which the centres of positive and negative charge differ, creating a dipole. The shape of this dipole reflects the asymmetry of the electron shape, and the team measured this by placing the molecules in an electric and a magnetic field and observing how they spin as the fields are changed. Variations in the rate of spin reveal any asymmetry. Their experiment measured the shape to within a few parts in 1018 but as far as they could tell, rather than being oval, the electron is spherical...

Mystery signal at Fermilab hints at 'technicolour' force - physics-math - 07 April 2011 - New Scientist

Mystery signal at Fermilab hints at 'technicolour' force : Just over 20 years ago, Lane, along with Fermilab physicist Estia Eichten, predicted that experiments would see just such a signal. Lane and Eichten were working on a theory known as technicolour, which proposes the existence of a fifth fundamental force in addition to the four already known: gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Technicolour is very similar to the strong force, which binds quarks together in the nuclei of atoms, only it operates at much higher energies. It is also able to give particles their mass – rendering the Higgs boson unnecessary.

The new force comes with a zoo of new particles. Lane and Eichten's model predicted that a technicolour particle called a technirho would often decay into a W boson and another particle called a technipion.

In a new paper, Lane, Eichten and Fermilab physicist Adam Martin suggest that a technipion with a mass of about 160 GeV could be the mysterious particle producing the two jets. "If this is real, I think people will give up on the idea of looking for the Higgs and begin exploring this rich world of new particles," Lane says.

What if supersymmetry is wrong? - New Scientist - New Scientist

What if supersymmetry is wrong?: Lane prefers an alternative theory. With physicist Estia Eichten of Batavia, Illinois, Lane showed that particles could come by their masses without a Higgs boson if there is a fifth force in addition to the four we know about: technicolour. It is similar to the strong force, which binds quarks together, but operates at much higher energies. "There's already a precedent for it in nature," Lane says, adding that it could also provide a new candidate for dark matter.

Short Sharp Science: LHC not yet a supersymmetry killer

Short Sharp Science: LHC not yet a supersymmetry killer: Last week, however, anticipated signs of SUSY were missing from the early data generated by the LHC's two experiments, ATLAS and CMS. Is there really cause for concern?

As described in Physics World, ATLAS and CMS have been exploring a particular version of supersymmetry called the constrained minimal supersymmetric standard model (CMSSM) with minimal supergravity (mSUGRA) - the easiest one to study.

And it is within this context that these experiments have so far failed to uncover evidence for SUSY. They have found no squarks and gluinos with a mass of less than 700 giga-electronvolts (GeV).

String Theory Fails Another Test, the “Supertest” � Not Even Wrong

String Theory Fails Another Test, the “Supertest” � Not Even Wrong: If you believe that string theory “predicts” low-energy supersymmetry, this is a serious failure. Completely independently of string theory, it’s a discouraging result for low-energy supersymmetry in general. The LHC has just dashed hopes that, at least for strongly-interacting particles, supersymmetry would show up just beyond the energy range accessible at the Tevatron.

50 ideas to change science forever: Cosmology - New Scientist - New Scientist

50 ideas to change science forever: Cosmology: Supersymmetry; The window to a new reality

The AdS/CFT correspondence; Superconductors from black holes

Hořava gravity; The end of space-time  

Quantum Darwinism; The fittest of all possible worlds

Random matrix theory; Not all randomness is equal

Exotic matter could show up in the LHC this year - physics-math - 08 September 2010 - New Scientist

Exotic matter could show up in the LHC this year: "Typical SUSY models assume heavy superpartners for the gluon and quarks, and a light neutral particle as a candidate for dark matter. But since the true masses of sparticles are uncertain, Matchev's team considered hundreds of possible masses for them, and worked out the routes by which they could decay into lighter objects."

Closing in on the inflaton, mother of the universe - physics-math - 18 August 2010 - New Scientist

Closing in on the inflaton, mother of the universe: "Until recently, however, this idea was still missing a crucial ingredient. To push space-time apart, the inflaton's field must maintain a potential energy in apparently empty space, known as "vacuum" energy. But physicists were long convinced that a unified particle would be too quick to give up the energy of its field, resulting in no inflation.

Now Antusch and colleagues have found a way to extend the time in which the field has a high vacuum energy, by prolonging the period in which the unified particle is nearly massless (arxiv.org/abs/1003.3233)."

How Planck's pain could be the LHC's gain - physics-math - 07 July 2010 - New Scientist

How Planck's pain could be the LHC's gain - physics-math - 07 July 2010 - New Scientist: "Two of the biggest prizes in physics today – the detection of gravitational waves (one of Planck's aims) and the discovery of a new set of particles (which the LHC is after) – could be at odds. Success for one could mean disappointment for the other."