
"Someone broke MY laws of physics? Oh, it's on now, science nerds!"
In 1905, the smartest man in the known world, Albert Einstein, postulated the theory of special relativity. In that theory, Einstein said that the speed of light is a universal constant, and that nothing can go faster than light. Well, according to the scientists at CERN, that might not be true. A beam of sub-atomic particles called neutrinos apparently traveled faster than light. When CERN isn’t creating antimatter or indulging in miniature big bangs, they’re breaking the laws of time and space!
During a project called OPERA, scientists in Switzerland fired a beam of neutrinos towards Gran Sasso in Italy. Amazingly, the 15,000 neutrinos traveled the 500-mile distance 60 nanoseconds faster than light would have, meaning they broke the speed of light here on earth. So much for the Standard Model of physics.
“We have high confidence in our results. We have checked and rechecked for anything that could have distorted our measurements but we found nothing. We now want colleagues to check them independently,” said Antonio Ereditato, the research group’s spokesman and a researcher at Berne University. “I just don’t want to think of the implications. We are scientists and work with what we know.”
Tags: Antonio Ereditato, CERN, Switzerland, neutrinos, particles go faster than light, Albert Einstein, physics, nuclear physics, faster than light particles, neutrinos go faster than light, theory of special relativity, OPERA, Berne University, Gran Sasso, Italy, Standard Model, physics Standard Model