The origin of CP violation, which is thought to be necessary for understanding the striking asymmetry in the abundance of matter and antimatter in the Universe, is one of the fundamental questions of particle physics. In 1964, Christenson, Cronin, Fitch, and Turlay found evidence for the violation of CP invariance in the neutral K system. The effect they discovered could be explained by a small imbalance between K0 -> K0 bar and K0 bar -> K0 mixing. Since their discovery, physicists have searched for "direct" CP violation, in which the CP symmetry is violated in the decay process. The topic of the colloquium will be the observation of this new form of CP violation by the KTeV experiment at Fermilab.

ANL Physics Division Colloquium Schedule