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Browsing by Author "Wilschut, H. W."

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  • Question of Lorentz violation in muon decay
    Publication . Noordmans, J. P.; Onderwater, C. J. G.; Wilschut, H. W.; Timmermans, R. G. E.
    Possibilities to test the Lorentz invariance of the weak interaction in muon decay are considered. We derive the direction-dependent muon-decay rate with a general Lorentz-violating addition to the W-boson propagator. We discuss measurements of the directional and boost dependence of the Michel parameters and of the muon lifetime as a function of absolute velocity. The total muon-decay rate in the Lorentz-violating standard model extension is addressed. Suggestions are made for dedicated (re) analyses of the pertinent data and for future experiments.
    2016-06Journal article Open access Show more
  • Test of Lorentz invariance in beta decay of polarized Na-20
    Publication . Sytema, A.; van den Berg, J. E.; Boll, O.; Chernowitz, D.; Dijck, E. A.; Grasdijk, J. O.; Hoekstra, S.; Jungmann, K.; Mathavan, S. C.; Meinema, C.; Mohanty, A.; Muller, S. E.; Noordmans, J. P.; Portela, M. Nunez; Onderwater, C. J. G.; Pijpker, C.; Timmermans, R. G. E.; Vos, K. K.; Willmann, L.; Wilschut, H. W.
    Background: Lorentz invariance is key in our understanding of nature, yet relatively few experiments have tested Lorentz invariance in weak interactions.Purpose: Our goal is to obtain limits on Lorentz-invariance violation in weak interactions, in particular rotational invariance in beta decay.Method: We search for a dependence of the lifetime of Na-20 nuclei on the nuclear spin direction. Such directional dependence would be evidence for Lorentz-invariance violation in weak interactions. A difference in lifetime between nuclei that are polarized in the east and west direction is searched for. This difference is maximally sensitive to the rotation of the Earth, while the sidereal dependence is free from most systematic errors.Results: The experiment sets a limit of 2 x 10(-4) at 90% C.L. on the amplitude of the sidereal variation of the relative lifetime differences, an improvement by a factor 15 compared to an earlier result.Conclusions: No significant violation of Lorentz invariance is found. The result sets limits on parameters of theories describing Lorentz-invariance violation.
    2016-08Journal article Open access Show more