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Power to the LHC data: an ASYmptotically MOdel-independent measurement of the W boson mass

Descrizione del progetto

Un enorme insieme di dati completamente nuovo potrebbe contribuire a circoscrivere la massa dei bosoni W

Secondo il modello standard della fisica delle particelle, il nostro intero universo è costituito da 17 particelle fondamentali. Esse comprendono gli elementi costitutivi della materia, sei quark e sei leptoni, nonché cinque particelle portatrici di forza, tra cui il bosone W. Il bosone W è stato scoperto all’incirca quattro decenni fa e gli scienziati stanno tuttora cercando di determinarne in modo preciso la massa. Esiste una discrepanza tra il suo valore previsto sulla base del modello standard e quello determinato a livello sperimentale. Il progetto ASYMOW, finanziato dall’UE, collauderà un nuovo approccio trascurando le conoscenze precedenti e affidandosi invece a una grande quantità di dati disponibili dagli esperimenti più avanzati.

Obiettivo

Despite its success in describing the sub-nuclear realm, the Standard Model of particle and field interactions cannot account for a number of experimental facts that constitute evidence of new and unknown physics. Sitting at both the energy and intensity frontier, the LHC grants the highest chances for solving the current puzzle. By exploiting the data collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC, ASYMOW aims at attaining an unprecedented experimental accuracy on a fundamental parameter of Nature: the mass of the W boson. As of today, there is a tension between the Standard Model expectation and the measured value of the W boson mass. A new measurement with a 10 MeV uncertainty, i.e. twice as small as the single best measurement, is a breakthrough: it could either rule out the tension or build a convincing case that this anomaly is real, thus implying the existence of new physics. The collider physics community has been pursuing this goal for decades. The quest now seems to have hit the wall of systematic uncertainty. This project proposes a new approach towards the W boson mass measurement, which will circumvent the systematic uncertainties that are currently limiting the precision. The novelty of the proposed method lies in its agnosticism with respect to the microscopic picture of W boson production in hadron collisions. The loss of prior knowledge inherent to this new approach will be asymptotically compensated by the large amount of data available for the measurement, as will be collected at the LHC. ASYMOW will be conducted by a small group of scientists and comes with great experimental and theoretical challenges. The main expected result is the measurement of the W boson mass with a precision better than the state-of-the-art. This may open new scenarios in particle physics.

Meccanismo di finanziamento

ERC-COG - Consolidator Grant

Istituzione ospitante

UNIVERSITA DI PISA
Contribution nette de l'UE
€ 936 250,00
Indirizzo
LUNGARNO PACINOTTI 43/44
56126 Pisa
Italia

Mostra sulla mappa

Regione
Centro (IT) Toscana Pisa
Tipo di attività
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Collegamenti
Costo totale
€ 936 250,00

Beneficiari (3)