Speaker
Nick Hutzler
(Caltech)
Description
The fact that the universe is made entirely out of matter, and
contains no free anti-matter, has no physical explanation. While we
cannot currently say what process created the matter in the universe,
we know that it must violate a number of fundamental symmetries,
including those that forbid the existence of certain electromagnetic
moments of fundamental particles. We can search for signatures of
these electromagnetic moments via precision measurements in polar
molecules, whose extremely large internal electromagnetic fields can
significantly amplify these moments. These effects would
arise from physics beyond the Standard Model, which enables tabletop
searches for new, symmetry-violating particles and forces. With
modern, quantum science techniques to control polar molecules, these
searches can currently reach into the TeV scale, and offer a route to the PeV scale through advanced cooling and trapping techniques. I will discuss a new experiment being developed at Caltech to use polyatomic molecules bearing heavy, deformed nuclei to search for hadronic CP violation via nuclear magnetic quadrupole moments, which are sensitive to a wide variety of CP-violating sources beyond the Standard Model.
| hutzler@caltech.edu | |
| Funding source | Heising-Simons Foundation |
Primary author
Nick Hutzler
(Caltech)
