Tevatron teams clash over new physics

Nature : Two groups whose experiments run at Fermilab’s Tevatron have reached different conclusions about a possible sighting of new particles that don’t fit the standard model of physics, writes Eugenie Samuel Reich for Nature. In April, researchers on the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) reported tentative evidence that new particles had surfaced in collisions that produced a W boson and jets of other particles. In May, they released data strengthening the case for novel particles. Researchers on the D0 experiment at Fermilab worked concurrently to confirm the CDF experiment’s conclusions, and today they announced that their data do not confirm the signal. Over the past decade, there have been only two or three significant disagreements between the two experiments. The two teams are going to work together to compare each other’s analyses, plot by plot; data analysis will continue even though the Tevatron is due to shut down in September.