Big break for charge symmetry

Two new experiments have detected charge-symmetry breaking, the mechanism responsible for protons and neutrons having different masses. Symmetry is a crucial concept in the theories that describe the subatomic world because it has an intimate connection with the laws of conservation. The theory of the strong interaction between quarks - quantum chromodynamics - is approximately invariant under what is called charge symmetry. In other words, if we swap an up quark for a down quark, then the strong interaction will look almost the same. This symmetry is related to the concept of isospin, and is not the same as charge conjugation (in which a particle is replaced by its antiparticle). Charge symmetry is broken by the competition between two different effects. The first is the small difference in mass between up and down quarks, which is about 200 times less than the mass of the proton. The second is their different electric charges. The up quark has a charge of +2/3 in units of the proton charge, while the down quark has a negative charge of -1/3. If charge symmetry was exact, the proton and the neutron would have the same mass and they would both be electrically neutral. This is because the proton is made of two up quarks and a down quark, while the neutron comprises two downs and an up. Replacing up quarks with down quarks, and vice versa, therefore transforms a proton into a neutron. Charge-symmetry breaking causes the neutron to be about 0.1% heavier than the proton because the down quark is slightly heavier than the up quark. Physicists had already elucidated certain aspects of charge-symmetry breaking, but our spirits were raised greatly when we heard of the recent work of Allena Opper of Ohio University in the US and co-workers at the TRIUMF laboratory in British Columbia, Canada. Her team has been trying to observe a small charge-symmetry-breaking effect for several years, using neutron beams at the TRIUMF accelerator. The researchers studied the production of neutral pi-mesons (pions) when a neutron is captured by a proton in a hydrogen target to form a deuteron. The probability, or cross-section, for this n + p → d + π0 reaction to occur depends on the angle between the momentum of the outgoing pion and that of the incident neutron beam. Another experimental team, led by Andy Bacher and Ed Stephenson at Indiana University in the US. Since the 1950s experimentalists have been trying to detect the formation of a neutral pion and an alpha particle in the fusion of two deuterons, d + d → α +π0. The experiment was approved and everything was set and ready, except for the fact that the IUCF was already scheduled to be transformed into a materials and medical research facility. Bacher and Stephenson's team worked frantically for two months and finally produced two separate observations of a beautiful peak at exactly the right pion energy. Their experimental cross-section is almost the same as our estimate, and this measurement of such a small charge-symmetry-breaking probability is an immense technical achievement. Now the ball is back in the theorists' court. A large group, including Antonio Fonseca at the University of Lisbon in Portugal, Anders Gardestig and Chuck Horowitz at Indiana University, Andreas Nogga at the University of Arizona, and the present authors, is carrying out the task of turning the initial estimate of the cross-section of the d + d → α +π0 reaction into a reliable calculation. The same charge-symmetry-breaking mechanisms contribute to both the TRIUMF and IUCF experiments, which means that together they can provide important information on the mass difference between up and down quarks. The origin of the quark masses is not fully understood. In the Standard Model of particle physics, the Higgs mechanism allows the generation of such masses but it cannot predict the actual mass values. This is like having a recipe to make cookies that will work with either chocolate chips or nuts. Why are the masses of the up and down quarks almost the same, and why are the masses of the other four quarks so very different? No fundamental understanding of this mass hierarchy exists. But the TRIUMF and IUCF experiments mean that nature's violation of charge symmetry can now be used to tackle at least the up-down piece of this puzzle. (U.K.)