The first results from China’s new neutrino observatory were published, hopeful signs both for the hunt for new physics and for China’s status as a scientific superpower.
Neutrinos are chargeless, low-mass particles, which interact with other matter only by literally hitting it; an extremely rare event, since matter is almost entirely empty space.
The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory will determine which neutrino types are heavier or lighter, and potentially reveal gaps in our understanding of the universe. Though it will need several more years’ worth of data, after just 59 days, its first measurements showed above-predicted precision. It’s also one of the world’s most sophisticated neutrino experiments, and a sign of China’s ambition in a frontier area of fundamental physics.