Tevatron accelerator yields hints of new particle

BBC : Data from Fermilab’s Tevatron particle accelerator, which could indicate a never-before-seen particle, may signal the most radical change in physics that has occurred in decades. Data from the collisions between protons and anti-protons yielded an unexpected “bump” that did not indicate the presence of the much-sought-after Higgs boson but rather something that the standard model does not include. The result is at the three-sigma level of certainty—there is about a one in a thousand chance that it is due to a statistical fluctuation and nothing more. Formal discoveries require a five-sigma level of certainty—a one in a million chance that the result is a statistical fluke. The possibility also exists that the result was caused by mismodelng of the background. Researchers have at least twice as much data as are contained in the first analysis , and they are working through the data to find out if their initial understanding was correct. If so, they may have discovered a fifth fundamental force of nature.