A CERN experiment claims to have caught neutrinos breaking the universe's most fundamental speed limit. The ghostly subatomic particles seem to have zipped faster than light from the particle physics laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland, to a detector in Italy.
Fish that physics textbook back out of the wastebasket, though: the new result contradicts previous measurements of neutrino speed that were based on a supernova explosion. What's more, there is still room for error in the departure time of the supposed speedsters. And even if the result is correct, thanks to theories that posit extra dimensions, it does not necessarily mean that the speed of light has been beaten.
"If it's true, it's fantastic. It will rock the foundation of physics," says Stephen Parke of Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois. "But we still have to confirm it."
Neutrinos are nearly massless subatomic particles that are notoriously shy of interacting with other forms of matter. An experiment called OPERA (Oscillation Project with Emusion tRacking Apparatus) sent beams of neutrinos from a particle accelerator at CERN to a detector in the Gran Sasso cavern in Italy, 730 kilometres away.
The neutrinos arrived 60 nanoseconds sooner than they would have if they had been travelling at the speed of light, the team says.
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