Large Hadron Collider May Have Produced New Matter

Covalent writes "The Large Hadron Collider, the world's largest and most powerful particle accelerator and the 'Big Bang machine' that was used to discover what appears to be the long-sought Higgs boson particle (as announced July 4), may have another surprise up its sleeve this year: The LHC looks to have produced a new type of matter, according to a new analysis of particle collision data by scientists at MIT and Rice University. The new type of matter, which has yet to be verified, is theorized to be one of two possible forms: Either 'color-glass condensate' — a flattened nucleus transformed into a 'wall' of gluons, which are smaller binding subatomic particles, or it could be 'quark-gluon plasma,' a dense, soup or liquid-like collection of individual particles."

Comments

First post

[Anonymous Coward]

that matters.

Re:First post

[sconeu]

Since it's made of gluons, it's probably very sticky.

Re:First post

[Just Some Guy]

And how may locomotives use one?

Excellent point. Can you imagine if we used our nuclear technologies for something so backward as, say, ironclad steamboats?

Re:First post

[styrotech]

Since it's made of gluons, it's probably very sticky.

I presume the anti particles are made of teflons.

No comments, then a flood of experts

[Anonymous Coward]

No comments, as no one here actually knows anything on the subject. Soon to be FULL of comments, by people passing themselves off as actually being subject matter experts on the topic.

Re:No comments, then a flood of experts

[Anonymous Coward]

As a matter of fact, I am an expert on this topic.

Re:No comments, then a flood of experts

[Revotron]

Imaginary studies done in my head suggest a strong positive correlation between average time-to-comment (TTC) on heavily-scientific Slashdot articles, and the current Wikipedia loading times. Increased delays in Slashdot commenting can be attributed to increased delays in reading the subject's Wikipedia page to amass a sufficient arsenal of technical jargon and basic principles to pass oneself off as an "academic".

Vanity, thy name is Slashdot.

Re:No comments, then a flood of experts

[tolkienfan]

Did it for you: +1 Insightful

Wait... DAMN!

Re:No comments, then a flood of experts

[Zephyn]

Let me 'splain. No. There is too much. Let me sum up.

We've discovered the Dread Particle Roberts?

Re:No comments, then a flood of experts

[bill_mcgonigle]

Oh enough on this, where is the car analogy guy when you need it?!

Two cars collided head-on and all the debris, blood, fluids, and remains lined up in a 2' wide straight line at a 104 degree angle to the collision. This was not the expected outcome.

“You don't expect quark gluon plasma effects

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody expects quark gluon plasma effects!

Re:New Matter?

[vmxeo]

I know its just the heading, but the whole "new matter" vs "new TYPE of matter" is kind of an important distinction.

Does it *really* matter?

Re:“You don't expect quark gluon plasma effe

[The_Wilschon]

Our chief weapon is Quarks! And Gluons! Our two chief weapons are Quarks and Gluons! And Plasma! ...

Re:New Matter?

[GoodNewsJimDotCom]

What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind.

Re:Do we need a new Mendeleev?

[Tomster]

To make significant advances with a successor hadron accelerator we'd be talking about building something at least several times larger and the obstacles are enormous... Staggering costs, the irradiation of the inner detectors, data processing, construction times stretching into multiple decades. Not to mention that the LHC consumed most of the world's supply of helium for years on end.
 

Well we'd best get started then. I can contribute $100 or so and will pick up some helium balloons from the party store. Anyone else in?