Just time for three quick items:<\/p>\n
In 1996 theorist Jonathan Feng attended a seminar about searches for new particles predicted by the mathematically elegant theory of Supersymmetry. The speaker was optimistic that researchers would find the particles at massive colliders such as the Tevatron, then in operation at the US Department of Energy\u2019s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, or the Large Hadron Collider, then under construction at CERN.<\/p>\n
Feng noticed Bruno Zumino, one of the founders of Supersymmetry, in the audience. Zumino\u2019s reaction to the talk confused Feng.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe left the seminar shaking his head,\u201d says Feng, who is now a professor at the University of California, Irvine. \u201cI thought he would be happy that an army of people were looking for his theory. So why was he shaking his head?\u201d<\/p>\n
Feng caught up with the distinguished theorist during the coffee break. He still remembers what Zumino told him: \u201cI never thought it would be this hard. If it\u2019s this hard, then they\u2019re never going to find it.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
So, twenty-six years ago one of the leaders of the field thought the idea was going nowhere and likely doomed. In the years after that LEP and the Tevatron put much stronger limits on SUSY before closing down in 2000 and 2011 respectively.
\nFrom 2010 to the present day, the LHC has again put far stronger limits on SUSY particles. Most now agree it is overwhelmingly unlikely that the rest of the LHC or HL-LHC runs will change the situation. And, prospects for a higher energy collider are very uncertain and many decades away. You’d think that would be the end of it.<\/p>\nBut the article quotes theorists determined to keep at it (no quotes from anyone who thinks SUSY is over) and there’s still an active community of people pursuing what Zumino thought was doomed multiple decades and accelerator generations ago. Large conferences continue to be scheduled, for example SUSY 22 this summer<\/a>, which will be preceded by a pre-SUSY school<\/a> designed to train a new generation to work on the failed ideas for many decades to come. <\/li>\n
- I’m leaving soon to spend a couple days in Texas, giving a colloquium talk at the University of Texas at Dallas math department<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Update<\/strong>: The slides from the talk at UT Dallas are here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just time for three quick items: There’s a wonderful book out now published by the Simons Center at Stony Brook, with the title Crossings. It tells the story of the center and of various people involved with it through a … Continue reading