Could There Be a Fifth Fundamental Force?

But maybe this forsome isn't alone. In a Hungarian team led by physicist Attila krasno Horci reportedly discovered new evidence for a fifth fundamental force, something previously unknown to science. The group uploaded another paper about the subject to archive a research database in October. While many scientists are skeptical about these findings, the research does give us an occasion to talk about the major forces that we all take

for granted. The fab four fundamental forces are irreducible, meaning they can't be broken down into other, more basic forces. These are the core phenomena behind every other known type of physical interaction. For example, friction, tension, and elasticity are all derived from electromagnetism. And what's that you ask? Electromagnetism is a force that affects all positively and negatively charged particles. Those with opposite charges attract, while one's carrying like charges

repel each other. Not only does this principle keep magnets on your fridge, but it's also the reason why solid objects are able to retain their shapes compared with electromagnetism. Gravity is rather weak. Surprisingly enough, it's actually the weakest of the four fundamentals, including the so called weak force. Will get to that one in a bit. Gravity is the attraction of any two objects in the universe to

one another. Moons, dustmotes, coyotes, whatever. Everything exerts gravity on every other thing, but at least one of the things in question has to be pretty massive in order for it to make much of a difference. That's why we don't have dust motes orbiting our heads like asteroids, and why we don't fall into orbit of coyotes when we encounter them. But let's turn to the appropriately named strong force.

This is what holds atomic nucleus is together even in spite of their charged protons which are constantly trying to escape. And last, but not least, there's the weak force a k a. The weak interaction. This one is the hardest to explain, and honestly I'm not an expert here, but it's the force by which sub atomic particles can transform by decaying into different particles by losing a boson, which

disintegrates into positrons and or neutrinos. This weak force fuels certain kinds of radioactive decay, which means it's responsible for everything from medical imaging to the radiometric dating that researchers used to determine the ages of fossils and artifacts, to the nuclear fission that occurs in the sun. So kind of a big deal. Scientists have a theory that nicely describes three of those forces, known as the Standard Model

of Physics. It's made up of various measurements in mathematical formulas. It also breaks down elementary particles into categories and subcategories. We spoke via email with m I T. Physicist Richard Milner. He explained the Standard Model of Physics is the present framework for describing the sub atomic world at all energies. It was developed post World War two, and I count at least eighteen Nobel Prizes in physics since nineteen fifty

have been awarded for contributions to its development. Like all good theories, the Standard Model has accurately predicted numerous scientific breakthroughs, including the discovery of the elusive Higgs Boson particle back in Yet it doesn't answer every question. The standard model offers no explanation for gravity, and it hasn't brought scientists any closer to understanding dark matter, a mysterious ingredient that makes up about of our universe. Here's where Krasna, hor

Kei and company come in. During sperariment at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Institute for Nuclear Research, they watched excited brilliant eight atoms decay inside a particle accelerator. Normally, this process releases light, which is later converted into electrons and positrons, which are a type of sub atomic particle with a positive charge. And sure enough, that's what happened. But then

things got interesting. Normally, brilliant eight decays in a predictable fashion, yet a weirdly high number of these electrons and positrons repelled each other at a one and forty degree angle. To explain the surplus cresta Horkis team argued that a never before seen particle had been formed as the atoms decayed. By their calculations, this theoretical sub atomic body would have a massive around seventeen million electron volts. They went ahead and named it the X seventeen particle, and now X

seventeen is once again making the news. Recently, the same Hungarian scientists detected an anomaly in decay examples of helium four. According to their archive paper, an unforeseen surplus of positrons and electrons were released, possibly because another X seventeen particle was created. If this mystery particle exists, it might be something very special. Maybe, just maybe it's a newfound carrier boson.

Bosons are spinning particles that probably lack internal structure. They're known to carry forces, making them an integral part of the Standard model. Under the Standard model, Milner explains forces take place by exchange of the carrier bosons between other sub atomic particles. It's said each of the four fundamental

forces has its own corresponding boson. The one that transports gravity hasn't been found yet, but the carrier bosons associated with strong force, weak force, and electromagnetism are well documented. Presumably X seventeen would be the carrier boson for a fifth fundamental force that we never do existed, and perhaps said force is how related to dark matter. But we're getting ahead of ourselves. You see, there's no hard proof

that X seventeen exists in the first place. The European Organization for Nuclear Research better known as CERN, has yet to find any trace of the particle, and the new archive paper is still awaiting peer review and replication from other scientists. Milner and his colleagues have devised a proposal to try to generate X seventeen particles in a scattering experiment at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility in Newport News, Virginia.

At present, the standard model doesn't account for any new fundamental forces, so if the X seventeen and the fifth force that it allegedly carries, our real will have to modify the good old standard model. At any rate, it's clear that the sub atomic world is still rife with secrets. Today's episode was written by Mark Mancini and produced by Tyler Clang. Brain Stuff is production of I Heart Radios.

Has Stuff Works. For more in this lots of other curious topics, visit our home planet how Stuff Works dot com, and for more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows