Muon g-2 wins Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics

Muon g-2 is a huge part of UChicago today, and it's just uh extremely gratifying to know that the Breakthrough Prize Committee selected this beautiful little experiment for the award this year. — What Muon g-2 is trying to understand is if we understand particle physics. — Are there new particles, new forces we haven't yet discovered in the universe? — It's looking for interactions of the muon with some unknown particle that would be new physics that goes beyond the standard model that we know and love. — So, with Muon g-2, what we're actually doing is measuring the magnetic moment of the muon because the sea of particles that's constantly fluctuating in and out of existence effectively changes the magnetic moment of the underlying muon. — To us as experimentalists, a really important part of that is we met our initial goals that we started writing down in 2007. — For me, it's still the only project that I've been involved with sort of from beginning to end. It's really been a maybe the best experience of my career. — I would say, by far, one of our most important byproducts is our ability to inspire future scientists. It all sounds like science fiction till you realize it's reality. — You know, there's different levels of recognition for accomplishments in the field. There's peer recognition, which is actually to us the most important. And then there's being recognized, you know, outside of your immediate peers. And it's a very nice feeling.