[June 24, 2011] University of Regina Professors Involved in Important Finding that may Shed Light on the Evolution of the Universe Tweet (Targeted News Service Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) REGINA, Canada, June 23 -- The University of Regina issued the following news release: The University of Regina is involved in an international experiment, which may help us understand how matter in the universe is formed. Dr. Mauricio Barbi, Associate Professor in the Department of Physics, Professor Ted Mathie, Dr. Nick Hasting, TRIUMF research scientist Dr. Roman Tacik and PhD students Spencer Giffin and Caio Licciardi are working on the Tokai-to-Kamioka (T2K) project in eastern Japan. The international team has detected the first indication of oscillation from muon-type neutrinos to electron-type neutrinos. The University of Regina group was instrumental in the construction of the Fine Grained Detector being used in the experiment, and is currently playing a leading role in the calibration and running of the experiment, development of data reconstruction of algorithms and in the analysis of the collected data. "The main benefit of this experiment is knowledge, because without knowledge we don't evolve," said Barbi. "At the end of the day the instruments and methods developed for this experiment may also have very practical applications in the field of medicine and software development." The study has found that muon neutrinos produced by a particle accelerator, located at the JPARC laboratory in Tokai, Japan, can transform into electron neutrinos as they travel across a long distance. The results attained by the T2K collaboration can shed light on an intriguing problem: why matter has prevailed over anti-matter in the creation of the universe. This asymmetry is responsible for the existence of the universe the way we know it and is known as CP-violation. Neutrinos are very elusive particles that abound in the universe as remnants of the Big-Bang. They come in three types, are subatomic particles similar to electrons but having no electric charge and masses millions of times smaller than electrons. The T2K discovery is reverberating throughout the international scientific community and will certainly have significant impact in the planning and development of new experiments worldwide. The T2K experiment was halted by the earthquake that struck Japan in March. The scientists expect to resume full operations by the end of this year. The international project consists of approximately 500 people from 12 countries and 59 different institutions. Canada is one of the largest contributors to the experiment, with over forty scientists contributing from the University of Regina; the University of Alberta; the University of Victoria; the University of Toronto; the University of British Columbia; York University and TRIUMF, Canada's national lab for particle physics. T2K is supported in Canada by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI). TNS C-paypan56- 110624-pp-3452304 71PayalPanda (c) 2011 Targeted News Service [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]