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Science

Neutrino Data Could Spell Trouble For Relativity 279

Science News has an exploration of the deeper implications of neutrino oscillation, one experimental confirmation of which we discussed last month. "The new findings could even signal a tiny breakdown of Einstein's theory of special relativity. ... MINOS [for Main Injector Neutrino Oscillation Search] found that during a 735-kilometer journey from Fermilab to the Soudan Underground Laboratory in Minnesota, about 37 percent of muon antineutrinos disappeared — presumably morphing into one of the other neutrino types — compared with just 19 percent of muon neutrinos. ... That difference in transformation rates suggests a difference in mass between antineutrinos and neutrinos. ... With the amount of data collected so far, there's just a 5% probability that the two types of particles weigh the same."

Comment Re:It is a big problem (Score 2, Informative) 165

Actually they call the individual detectors DOMs-Digital Optical Modules. Each string has 60 DOMs on it (plus 4 DOMs on the surface config IceTop) and altogether there will be 86 strings. Right now there are 79. Of course they calibrate, test, re-test before deployment, and troubleshoot when there are problems, but yeah if a DOM is out it's out.

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