Chapter 233 Bad News

The shorter the word, the greater the amount of information.

Reminiscent of what Academician Lu said to himself after attending the International Conference on Theoretical Physics in Brussels, Lu Zhou already had a vague premonition that Professor Frank might have something important to say to him.

So, he didn't neglect at all, and quickly replied to the email.

[I can do it anytime, see when you are free? 】

After waiting for a while, Professor Frank did not reply.

Lu Zhou looked at the time, guessing that he probably fell asleep, so he got up, went into the bathroom, took a shower, and went to rest.

Nothing to say all night.

The next morning, Lu Zhou woke up listening to the alarm, checked his e-mail, and got a reply.

[I will go to Stony Brook University the day after tomorrow, and I will probably stay there for three days. If you are free, we can meet there. 】

Lu Zhou glanced at the calendar.

There was a lecture in two days, but he had already asked Professor Deligne for leave.

After thinking about it, he edited an email and replied.

[Okay, then the day after tomorrow at noon, I will contact you when it arrives. 】

The reply was only two letters.

【OK】

...

New York, located on the east coast, is the economic and cultural hub of the entire east coast, as well as one of the technology centers of the east coast.

Many people know Wall Street and Broadway on Manhattan Island, but few people know that it is on Long Island next door, and it is also home to Brookhaven National Laboratory, one of the world's top comprehensive scientific research bases.

Many Nobel Prizes have been born here, including the non-conservation of parity by Yang Zhenning and Li Zhengdao, and the J particle discovered by Ding Zhaozhong. At present, there are about 3,000 researchers and engineers here, and an average of 4,000 visiting scholars work here every year.

Although not as good as CERN, it is still a considerable figure.

To a large extent, that's what the collider is about. On the surface, the discovery of a novel particle does not seem to change human life immediately, but it can attract a large number of scholars to gather here, spawn a large number of suppliers who focus on cutting-edge equipment, and form a huge "scientific research ecology" .

For example, the storage ring of the Hadron Collider requires almost harsh vacuum conditions, which has given birth to the development of ultra-high vacuum technology, and these technologies have finally exerted industrial value in the fields of medical treatment and electronics industry.

And similar things, there are many.

The lab is currently part of the Department of Energy, but it is managed by the Brookhaven Institute for Science, a company formed by Stony Brook University and the Battelle Institute.

It happened to be Monday, and Lu Zhou arrived in New York in his newly bought car.

Professor Frank made an appointment to meet him at the coffee shop in front of Stony Brook University. I don't know if it's Lu Zhou's illusion, but he always feels that several professors he knows have a soft spot for things like coffee.

After sitting in the cafe until twelve o'clock, Professor Frank arrived at the meeting place on time, with a laptop in his hand.

"I'm sorry, I was late for a meeting and kept you waiting."

Lu Zhou smiled and said, "No, I just arrived too."

Sitting opposite Lu Zhou, Professor Frank saw the waiter and said in a relaxed tone, "Give me an American coffee and a tuna sandwich."

Waiter: "Do you need to add sugar?"

"Need not."

While ordering from the waiter, Professor Frank put the laptop on the table, opened the folder, looked at Lu Zhou and asked, "Did you bring a USB flash drive?"

Lu Zhou nodded, took out the USB flash drive from his pocket and put it on the table, "I have it...can you tell me what it is? Although I don't mind drinking coffee with you, if it's just data, Why don't we use email like we used to?"

Professor Frank did not answer the question immediately, but operated the computer, opened a chart file, then turned the laptop around and presented it in front of Lu Zhou.

Looking at the image on the screen, Lu Zhou frowned slightly, "This is?"

Professor Frank moved his chair to the side of the table, said the image on the screen.

"This is the latest CERN experiment record. The two graphs above are the distribution curves and statistical graphs of collision events in each energy region collected by ATLAS and CMS detectors. You should be able to see the meaning of this graph."

After staring at the image for a while, Lu Zhou's expression gradually became serious, "Has the confidence level dropped?"

Professor Frank sighed softly, "Yes, no matter how many sets of experiments we repeat, the confidence level is still not up to the 3sigma standard. And in the experiment at the end of last year, the characteristic peak appeared in the 750GeV energy region, and even shrank... That’s what you’re seeing the drop in confidence.”

After staring at the icon for a long time, Lu Zhou did not speak for a long time.

He had vaguely guessed the reason why Professor Frank wanted to talk to him face to face.

Seeing that Lu Zhou didn't speak, Professor Frank paused for a moment and continued.

"The big international theoretical physics conference in Brussels at the end of the year is very big. It's a pity that you missed that conference."

"At that time, the latest discovery on the accelerator was reported by Ms. Fabiola Gianotti, the newly elected 16th director of the CERN Council. The site of the report meeting was full, and many people sat on the ground, even outside. corridor."

"There were a lot of things reported in that presentation, especially the 20 minutes spent reporting CERN's discovery at 750GeV."

"You should be able to understand these pictures, or you can take them back to study," Professor Frank sighed and said softly, "Although the meaning is not great anymore."

Lu Zhou didn't look at the computer anymore, but stared at Professor Frank, waiting for him to continue.

Responding to the junior's gaze, Professor Frank shrugged, trying to make his tone less heavy, and continued: "But anyway, you have been of great help. From May last year to two months ago , A large number of papers have emerged on Arxiv, including many novel physical models. They may not be correct, but they are very useful. And the two papers we co-authored have also been cited many times by peers.”

Although this sentence sounded like comfort, Lu Zhou didn't get any comfort from it at all.

For this project, he has already spent half a year. Although for a theoretical physicist, half a year is nothing, and it is not even enough for them to grow back the hair that they have lost. But for Lu Zhou, The meaning of this topic is completely different.

Not only because of the time he squeezed out of his busy schedule to build those models, but also because of the hope he poured into 750GeV...

Taking a deep breath, Lu Zhou looked at Professor Frank and said slowly, "What do you mean?"

Professor Frank's reaction confirmed his guess.

The old man stood up, took off his hat, nodded slightly to express his gratitude,

"CERN's official explanation to the experts of the council states is that there is still hope, but obviously, from the experimental plan after January 1st, no more experiments will be arranged to retrieve the anomaly of the 750GeV characteristic peak, because it is disappearing, and Every collision of particle clusters costs money. It was a pleasure working with you, and I sincerely appreciate your work, but..."

After speaking, Professor Frank cleared his throat, lowered his eyes slightly, and expressed regret, "Our reason tells us that it is much easier to build a physical model to explain why there is no particle at 750GeV than to find the particle that does not exist."

However, the significance of this work is not much.

Explaining why a particle does not exist, this kind of unfalsifiable and unverifiable guess, is at best the level of a doctoral thesis. It may be able to help several high-energy physics Ph.Ds who have not graduated successfully get their degrees, but it is far from "new physics".

Lu Zhou was silent for a long time.

After a long time, he seemed to have made up his mind and said.

"But I haven't given up yet."

Professor Frank didn't say anything more, put on his hat again, and sighed softly.

"Good luck then."