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Although the muon is unstable, it is very massive – 207 times heavier than an electron. It is much easier to measure the magnetic moment of such particles. In addition, the scientists were able to measure the anomaly in the electron’s magnetic moment with high accuracy and knew that its source was the interaction with the quanta of the electromagnetic field, which was consistent with theoretical calculations. However, the muon magnetic moment anomaly cannot be explained within the framework of the Standard Model of elementary particles.

In addition to the fields and particles we know the muon’s magnetic moment deviates from normative values, something modern physics has no idea about. If scientists could measure this unknown effect with sufficient precision – show it exists, it would open the way for a new physics as it would imply the existence of unknown forces (fields) or fundamental particles in nature. The heavy muon is ideal for such experiments, although it lives for just over a few microseconds, and the latest data from scientists at Fermilab is one of the newest steps in that direction.

Two sessions of long-term observations in Fermilab’s Muon g-2 experiment yielded an impressive but still controversial result. The scientists reported that the reliability of the measured muon magnetic moment anomaly was 5 sigma, which is enough for a discovery claim. In other words, scientists with scientifically accepted credibility proved that there are fields or particles in the world that go beyond the Standard Model.

A stone in line with these statements is that scientists have used theoretical data until 2020 in their scientific studies. The thing is, they are outdated and have already been criticized. The authors of the study are aware of this and will therefore continue to collect statistics on their setup in subsequent measurements. Them Plans to prove or disprove the existence of a “fifth” unknown force in the world by 2025 or some fundamental particle that no one knows about.