Precision measurement of the mass difference between light nuclei and anti-nuclei

ALICE Collaboration

doi:10.1038/nphys3432

Precision measurement of the mass difference between light nuclei and anti-nuclei

ALICE Collaboration

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

54 Scopus citations

Abstract

The measurement of the mass differences for systems bound by the strong force has reached a very high precision with protons and anti-protons. The extension of such measurement from (anti-)baryons to (anti-)nuclei allows one to probe any difference in the interactions between nucleons and anti-nucleons encoded in the (anti-)nuclei masses. This force is a remnant of the underlying strong interaction among quarks and gluons and can be described by effective theories, but cannot yet be directly derived from quantum chromodynamics. Here we report a measurement of the difference between the ratios of the mass and charge of deuterons (d) and anti-deuterons (), and 3 He and nuclei carried out with the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) detector in Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of 2.76 €‰TeV. Our direct measurement of the mass-over-charge differences confirms CPT invariance to an unprecedented precision in the sector of light nuclei. This fundamental symmetry of nature, which exchanges particles with anti-particles, implies that all physics laws are the same under the simultaneous reversal of charge(s) (charge conjugation C), reflection of spatial coordinates (parity transformation P) and time inversion (T).

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	811-814
Number of pages	4
Journal	Nature Physics
Volume	11
Issue number	10
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys3432
State	Published - Oct 1 2015
Externally published	Yes

Funding

European Commission (ALFA-EC) and the EPLANET Program (European Particle Physics Latin American Network) Stichting voor Fundamenteel Onderzoek der Materie (FOM) and the Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO), Netherlands; Research Council of Norway (NFR); National Science Centre, Poland; Ministry of National Education/Institute for Atomic Physics and Consiliul Naional al Cercetrii tiinifice-Executive Agency for Higher Education Research Development and Innovation Funding (CNCS-UEFISCDI)-Romania; Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russian Federal Agency of Atomic Energy, Russian Federal Agency for Science and Innovations and The Russian Foundation for Basic Research; Ministry of Education of Slovakia; Department of Science and Technology, South Africa; Centro de Investigaciones Energeticas, Medioambientales y Tecnologicas (CIEMAT), E-Infrastructure shared between Europe and Latin America (EELA), Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO) of Spain, Xunta de Galicia (Consellería de Educación), Centro de Aplicaciones Tecnolgicas y Desarrollo Nuclear (CEADEN), Cubaenergía, Cuba, and IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency); Swedish Research Council (VR) and Knut & Alice Wallenberg Foundation (KAW); Ukraine Ministry of Education and Science; United Kingdom Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC); The United States Department of Energy, the United States National Science Foundation, the State of Texas, and the State of Ohio; Ministry of Science, Education and Sports of Croatia and Unity through Knowledge Fund, Croatia; Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi, India. The ALICE Collaboration would like to thank all its engineers and technicians for their invaluable contributions to the construction of the experiment and the CERN accelerator teams for the outstanding performance of the LHC complex. The ALICE Collaboration gratefully acknowledges the resources and support provided by all Grid centres and the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG) collaboration. The ALICE Collaboration acknowledges the following funding agencies for their support in building and running the ALICE detector: State Committee of Science, World Federation of Scientists (WFS) and Swiss Fonds Kidagan, Armenia; Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq), Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos (FINEP), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP); National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), the Chinese Ministry of Education (CMOE) and the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (MSTC); Ministry of Education and Youth of the Czech Republic; Danish Natural Science Research Council, the Carlsberg Foundation and the Danish National Research Foundation; The European Research Council under the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme; Helsinki Institute of Physics and the Academy of Finland; French CNRS-IN2P3, the ‘Region Pays de Loire’, ‘Region Alsace’, ‘Region Auvergne’ and CEA, France; German Bundesministerium fur Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie (BMBF) and the Helmholtz Association; General Secretariat for Research and Technology, Ministry of Development, Greece; Hungarian Orszagos Tudomanyos Kutatasi Alappgrammok (OTKA) and National Office for Research and Technology (NKTH); Department of Atomic Energy and Department of Science and Technology of the Government of India; Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) and Centro Fermi-Museo Storico della Fisica e Centro Studi e Ricerche ‘Enrico Fermi’, Italy; MEXT Grant-in-Aid for Specially Promoted Research, Japan; Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna; National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF); Consejo Nacional de Cienca y Tecnologia (CONACYT), Direccion General de Asuntos del Personal Academico (DGAPA), México; Amerique Latine Formation academique

Funders	Funder number
ALFA-EC
Amerique Latine Formation Academique
Danish Natural Science Research Council
Department of Atomic Energy and Department of Science and Technology of the Government of India
General Secretariat for Research and Technology, Ministry of Development
Helsinki Institute of Physics
Hungarian Orszagos Tudomanyos Kutatasi Alappgrammok
Ministry of Education and Youth of the Czech Republic
Ministry of Education of Slovakia
Ministry of National Education/Institute for Atomic Physics and Consiliul Naional al Cercetrii tiinifice-Executive Agency for Higher Education Research Development and Innovation Funding
Ministry of Science, Education and Sports of Croatia and Unity
NFR
Region Auvergne’ and CEA
Russian Federal Agency of Atomic Energy, Russian Federal Agency for Science and Innovations
State Committee of Science, World Federation
Swiss Fonds Kidagan
United Kingdom Science and Technology Facilities Council
Xunta de Galicia (Consellería de Educación
National Science Foundation	1307461, 1407051
U.S. Department of Energy
Seventh Framework Programme
Science and Technology Facilities Council
European Commission
European Research Council
Department of Science and Technology, Ministry of Science and Technology, India
Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, India
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science	15H03664, 25287048, 26610071, 26220707
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology
Danmarks Grundforskningsfond
Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
National Natural Science Foundation of China
Russian Foundation for Basic Research
Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China
Academy of Finland	CNRS-IN2P3
Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung
Russian Academy of Sciences
Carlsbergfondet
Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China
Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek
Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad
Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation
Hungarian Scientific Research Fund
Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico
National Research Foundation of Korea
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research
Nemzeti Kutatási és Technológiai Hivatal
Instituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare
Knut och Alice Wallenbergs Stiftelse
Narodowe Centrum Nauki
Vetenskapsrådet
International Atomic Energy Agency
Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos
Norges Forskningsråd
Dirección General de Asuntos del Personal Académico, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Unitatea Executiva pentru Finantarea Invatamantului Superior, a Cercetarii, Dezvoltarii si Inovarii
Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine
Helmholtz Association
Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas
Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie
Conseil Régional des Pays de la Loire
Museo Storico della Fisica e Centro Studi e Ricerche Enrico Fermi
Centro de Aplicaciones Tecnológicas y Desarrollo Nuclear

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10.1038/nphys3432

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title = "Precision measurement of the mass difference between light nuclei and anti-nuclei",

abstract = "The measurement of the mass differences for systems bound by the strong force has reached a very high precision with protons and anti-protons. The extension of such measurement from (anti-)baryons to (anti-)nuclei allows one to probe any difference in the interactions between nucleons and anti-nucleons encoded in the (anti-)nuclei masses. This force is a remnant of the underlying strong interaction among quarks and gluons and can be described by effective theories, but cannot yet be directly derived from quantum chromodynamics. Here we report a measurement of the difference between the ratios of the mass and charge of deuterons (d) and anti-deuterons (), and 3 He and nuclei carried out with the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) detector in Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of 2.76 €‰TeV. Our direct measurement of the mass-over-charge differences confirms CPT invariance to an unprecedented precision in the sector of light nuclei. This fundamental symmetry of nature, which exchanges particles with anti-particles, implies that all physics laws are the same under the simultaneous reversal of charge(s) (charge conjugation C), reflection of spatial coordinates (parity transformation P) and time inversion (T).",

author = "{ALICE Collaboration} and J. Adam and D. Adamov{\'a} and Aggarwal, {M. M.} and {Aglieri Rinella}, G. and M. Agnello and N. Agrawal and Z. Ahammed and I. Ahmed and Ahn, {S. U.} and I. Aimo and S. Aiola and M. Ajaz and A. Akindinov and Alam, {S. N.} and D. Aleksandrov and B. Alessandro and D. Alexandre and {Alfaro Molina}, R. and A. Alici and A. Alkin and J. Alme and T. Alt and S. Altinpinar and I. Altsybeev and {Alves Garcia Prado}, C. and C. Andrei and A. Andronic and V. Anguelov and J. Anielski and T. Anticic and F. Antinori and P. Antonioli and L. Aphecetche and H. Appelsh{\"a}user and S. Arcelli and N. Armesto and R. Arnaldi and T. Aronsson and Arsene, {I. C.} and M. Arslandok and A. Augustinus and R. Averbeck and Azmi, {M. D.} and M. Bach and A. Badal{\`a} and Baek, {Y. W.} and S. Bagnasco and R. Bailhache and F. Bock and Read, {K. F.}",

year = "2015",

month = oct,

day = "1",

doi = "10.1038/nphys3432",

language = "English",

volume = "11",

pages = "811--814",

journal = "Nature Physics",

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publisher = "Nature Research",

number = "10",

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T1 - Precision measurement of the mass difference between light nuclei and anti-nuclei

AU - ALICE Collaboration

AU - Adam, J.

AU - Adamová, D.

AU - Aggarwal, M. M.

AU - Aglieri Rinella, G.

AU - Agnello, M.

AU - Agrawal, N.

AU - Ahammed, Z.

AU - Ahmed, I.

AU - Ahn, S. U.

AU - Aimo, I.

AU - Aiola, S.

AU - Ajaz, M.

AU - Akindinov, A.

AU - Alam, S. N.

AU - Aleksandrov, D.

AU - Alessandro, B.

AU - Alexandre, D.

AU - Alfaro Molina, R.

AU - Alici, A.

AU - Alkin, A.

AU - Alme, J.

AU - Alt, T.

AU - Altinpinar, S.

AU - Altsybeev, I.

AU - Alves Garcia Prado, C.

AU - Andrei, C.

AU - Andronic, A.

AU - Anguelov, V.

AU - Anielski, J.

AU - Anticic, T.

AU - Antinori, F.

AU - Antonioli, P.

AU - Aphecetche, L.

AU - Appelshäuser, H.

AU - Arcelli, S.

AU - Armesto, N.

AU - Arnaldi, R.

AU - Aronsson, T.

AU - Arsene, I. C.

AU - Arslandok, M.

AU - Augustinus, A.

AU - Averbeck, R.

AU - Azmi, M. D.

AU - Bach, M.

AU - Badalà, A.

AU - Baek, Y. W.

AU - Bagnasco, S.

AU - Bailhache, R.

AU - Bock, F.

AU - Read, K. F.

PY - 2015/10/1

Y1 - 2015/10/1

N2 - The measurement of the mass differences for systems bound by the strong force has reached a very high precision with protons and anti-protons. The extension of such measurement from (anti-)baryons to (anti-)nuclei allows one to probe any difference in the interactions between nucleons and anti-nucleons encoded in the (anti-)nuclei masses. This force is a remnant of the underlying strong interaction among quarks and gluons and can be described by effective theories, but cannot yet be directly derived from quantum chromodynamics. Here we report a measurement of the difference between the ratios of the mass and charge of deuterons (d) and anti-deuterons (), and 3 He and nuclei carried out with the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) detector in Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of 2.76 €‰TeV. Our direct measurement of the mass-over-charge differences confirms CPT invariance to an unprecedented precision in the sector of light nuclei. This fundamental symmetry of nature, which exchanges particles with anti-particles, implies that all physics laws are the same under the simultaneous reversal of charge(s) (charge conjugation C), reflection of spatial coordinates (parity transformation P) and time inversion (T).

AB - The measurement of the mass differences for systems bound by the strong force has reached a very high precision with protons and anti-protons. The extension of such measurement from (anti-)baryons to (anti-)nuclei allows one to probe any difference in the interactions between nucleons and anti-nucleons encoded in the (anti-)nuclei masses. This force is a remnant of the underlying strong interaction among quarks and gluons and can be described by effective theories, but cannot yet be directly derived from quantum chromodynamics. Here we report a measurement of the difference between the ratios of the mass and charge of deuterons (d) and anti-deuterons (), and 3 He and nuclei carried out with the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) detector in Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair of 2.76 €‰TeV. Our direct measurement of the mass-over-charge differences confirms CPT invariance to an unprecedented precision in the sector of light nuclei. This fundamental symmetry of nature, which exchanges particles with anti-particles, implies that all physics laws are the same under the simultaneous reversal of charge(s) (charge conjugation C), reflection of spatial coordinates (parity transformation P) and time inversion (T).

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U2 - 10.1038/nphys3432

DO - 10.1038/nphys3432

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:84943198109

SN - 1745-2473

VL - 11

SP - 811

EP - 814

JO - Nature Physics

JF - Nature Physics

IS - 10

ER -

Precision measurement of the mass difference between light nuclei and anti-nuclei

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