Thu Sep 22, 2011 3:09pm EDT
* Finding could overturn laws of physics
* Scientists confident measurements correct (Adds background
and quotes)
By Robert Evans
GENEVA, Sept 22 (Reuters) - An international team of scientists said
on Thursday they had recorded sub-atomic particles travelling
faster than light -- a finding that could overturn one of Einstein's
long-accepted fundamental laws of the universe.
Antonio Ereditato, spokesman for the researchers, told Reuters
that measurements taken over three years showed neutrinos
pumped from CERN near Geneva to Gran Sasso in Italy had
arrived 60 nanoseconds quicker than light would have done.
"We have high confidence in our results. We have checked and
rechecked for anything that could have distorted our
measurements but we found nothing," he said. "We now want
colleagues to check them independently."
If confirmed, the discovery would undermine Albert Einstein's
1905 theory of special relativity, which says that the speed of light
is a "cosmic constant" and that nothing in the universe can travel
faster.