Category: Mirror-Matter

An invited review: neutron lifetime anomaly and mirror matter theory

It still feels like yesterday. Almost exactly four years ago, also around Chinese New Year, I finished my first paper (or to be exact, two) on the new mirror matter theory. Now I just finished my first invited review paper, which exactly details the original motivations on solving the puzzles of neutron lifetime in my first published paper. It feels like I just completed the circle. So many thanks for Dr. Ben Grinstein’s invitation. I’ve been trying to write a review on mirror matter theory and related experiments and observations for a long time. But it never came through. Ben’s invitation has really pushed me to finish this review paper earlier. It is not the full review paper I have imagined, but still a very important part of it. It focuses on the unique perspectives in the analysis of the neutron lifetime anomaly and the CKM unitarity issue, which have been mostly overlooked by the mainstream. It does not present the full picture and details of mirror matter theory. Instead, it gives the details of the phenomenological $n-n’$ oscillation model, and presents exactly how it can explain the above puzzles and how we can test its unique predictions in laboratory experiments.

Here is the paper: Neutron lifetime anomaly and mirror matter theory

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A new milestone paper on mirror matter theory

After procrastinating for almost a year, I finally finished this paper. It is going to be recognized as a new milestone on mirror matter studies. In particular, amazing connections between string theory and new supersymmetric mirror models are established. Mirror symmetry as a fundamental concept is deeply examined. Based on mathematical results from string theory, we can finally put these mirror models on a firmer and self-consistent ground and can really explain an impressive list of puzzles in fundamental physics and cosmology. Without further ado, here it is:

Mirror symmetry for new physics beyond the Standard Model in 4D spacetime
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First experimental work to test my mirror oscillation model

The first experimental paper by BESIII collaboration (motivated under new mirror oscillation model) has just been published: Search for invisible decays of the Λ baryon. It was the first direct test of my idea on neutral hadron oscillations. It gives an upper limit of the invisible decay branching fraction for the Λ baryon: <7.4×10−5 , which is consistent with my model. Unfortunately, it is not sensitive enough yet to reach the level of my prediction in the new model: 4.4×10−7. I hope that more experimental works will be coming on invisible decays of other hadrons like K0L and K0S. I wish that people in the business of neutron lifetime measurements could have done much more convincing tests earlier.

A crackpot’s counter-statement

Some physicists have labeled me as a crack pot when considering my works on the new theoretical framework of mirror matter theory. However, I disagree in the spirit of scientific principles. With three papers published in esteemed journals, seven invited seminars by unrelated people (or more than 10 in total), and grant-seeking in collaboration with several different groups, I don’t think that it is fair to categorize my work on this topic as crackpottery. It is not, especially when considering the unique concrete predictions from my new model that can be readily tested in the laboratory using existing technologies.

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Future of the new mirror matter theory

The new mirror matter theory has only a very rough framework with many of its aspects waiting to be greatly improved and further developed as a nascent research direction. In particular, its mathematical rigor and foundations have yet to be established. Relevant new mathematical tools and approaches are desired to be implemented in the new theory. Theoretical efforts in the past several decades on fundamental physics, especially on topological quantum field theory, string theory, and quantum gravity, need to be merged into the new theoretical framework under the guidance of the newly proposed first principles. Most importantly, the neutral hadron oscillation effects predicted by the new theory are ready to be experimentally tested in laboratory, and it is time for more observation and simulation works in astronomy and cosmology under the consideration of the new theory to be conducted.

As presented below, I’d like to say a few words on the future direction of the new theory to interested mathematicians and physicists.

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New paper on first principles

I just tried to post my new paper of “First Principles of Consistent Physics” on arXiv.org. Unfortunately it was put on hold immediately and I then submitted it to the OSF eprint server. This is quite an exciting paper to me. It proposes new foundations and guiding principles on fundamental physics and cosmology based and improved upon my early blog “first principles of physics“. It should shed new light on further developments of the new mirror framework.

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First principles of physics

The approach of first principles has been pursued in the development and history of physics. Ever since the establishment of the Standard Model of particle physics in 1970s, the idea of going after theory of everything has become popular as the latest approach of first principles among theoretical physicists for unifying all particles and interactions. However, we seem to live in a dynamic world as indicated, e.g., since the discovery of an expanding Universe and it is definitely at odds with the static picture of an ultimate unified theory for physics.

The dynamic picture tells us that the time reversal symmetry has to be broken and it has to be the first (broken) symmetry. Whatever first principles we propose have to be able to naturally break this symmetry first in the very beginning. And there is no reason why the current 4-dimensional spacetime, in particular, its dimensions can’t be dynamic. It is probably more natural to consider that spacetime has evolved in a dimension-by-dimension way.

First of all, we propose and summarize the three first principles as follows:

  1. A measurable finite physical world is assumed.
  2. The quantum version of the variation principle in terms of Feynman’s path integral formalism is applied.
  3. Spacetime emerges via dimensional phase transitions (i.e., first time dimension and then space dimensions got inflated).
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How should private foundations support science?

It is amazing that there exist quite some private foundations in the United States who care about science and are enthusiastic about funding scientific projects. However, a lot of them, if not all, don’t seem to know how they should support science in a complementary way when compared to government funding agencies like NSF and DoE.

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Time to reform peer-review

One of the critical features in scientific research is the application of the so-called peer-review process before a scientific paper is officially published in a journal. Ideally, peer-review, at least seemingly in its original purpose, should serve as a measure of quality control that benefits both the authors and the readers. However, nowadays, it becomes more and more like an obstruction to the advancement of science, in particular, in terms of radically new ideas and directions.

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