[Seminars] EFI Colloquium TODAY

[Mary Heintz]

*** EFI COLLOQUIUM ***

Please join us!

TODAY at 3:30pm in MCP 201 

A Tabletop-Scale Probe for Multi-TeV Scale Physics: The Electron Dipole Moment of The Electron
David DeMille, Yale University

Violation of time-reversal (T) symmetry is observed in K- and B-meson systems,
and these measurements are explained within the standard model (SM) of
electroweak interactions. However, additional sources of T violation are
needed to explain the cosmological asymmetry between matter and
antimatter. In the presence of T-violation, elementary particles such as the
electron can have an electric dipole moment (EDM) along their spin axis. The
SM prediction for the electron EDM is nonzero, but too small to detect. By
contrast, extensions to the SM frequently predict EDMs within experimental
reach. Our tabletop-scale experiment, ACME, uses methods of atomic and
molecular physics to detect the electron EDM. Our recent result for the EDM is
consistent with zero, but sets a limit ten times smaller than any previous work.
Remarkably, this limit sets strong constraints on theories of physics beyond the
SM. In many specific models, ACME probes physics associated with new
particles whose mass is well above the few-TeV scale explored directly at the
Large Hadron Collider. With excellent prospects for dramatic future
improvements in sensitivity, EDM searches have the promise to probe
plausible models of new physics even at the PeV scale.