COSMIC rays that zip into our atmosphere from deep space may have provided evidence of “supersymmetry”. This theory predicts a new, corresponding particle for each of those we currently know, and is a possible successor to today’s Standard Model.
During experiments in the upper atmosphere in 1994 and 1995, the High Energy Antimatter Telescope (HEAT) detected more positrons – the antimatter partners of electrons – than theorists expected. And a revamped detector which collected more data last year confirmed the excess, says Stephane Coutu of Pennsylvania State University in University Park.
Cosmic-ray positrons are thought to originate from collisions between atomic nuclei…
