An experimental search for an explanation of the difference between beam and bottle neutron lifetime measurements

M. F. Blatnik; L. S. Blokland; N. Callahan; J. H. Choi; S. Clayton; C. B Cude-Woods; B. W. Filippone; W. R. Fox; E. Fries; P. Geltenbort; F. M. Gonzalez; L. Hayen; K. P. Hickerson; A. T. Holley; T. M. Ito; A. Komives; S Lin; Chen-Yu Liu; M. F. Makela; C. L. Morris; R. Musedinovic; C. M. O'Shaughnessy; R. W. Pattie Jr.; J. C. Ramsey; D. J. Salvat; A. Saunders; S. J. Seestrom; E. I. Sharapov; M. Singh; Z. Tang; W. F. Uhrich; J. Vanderwerp; P. Walstrom; Z. Wang; A. R. Young

arXiv · 2406.10378

An experimental search for an explanation of the difference between beam and bottle neutron lifetime measurements

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Abstract

The past two decades have yielded several new measurements and reanalysis of older measurements of the neutron lifetime. These have led to a 4.4 standard deviation discrepancy between the most precise measurements of the neutron decay rate producing protons in cold neutron beams and the most precise lifetime measured in neutron storage experiments. Here we publish an analysis of the recently published UCN aimed a searching for an explanation of this difference using the model proposed by Koch and Hummel.

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M. F. Blatnik, L. S. Blokland, N. Callahan, J. H. Choi, S. Clayton, C. B Cude-Woods, B. W. Filippone, W. R. Fox, E. Fries, P. Geltenbort, F. M. Gonzalez, L. Hayen, K. P. Hickerson, A. T. Holley, T. M. Ito, A. Komives, S Lin, Chen-Yu Liu, M. F. Makela, C. L. Morris, R. Musedinovic, C. M. O'Shaughnessy, R. W. Pattie Jr., J. C. Ramsey, D. J. Salvat, A. Saunders, S. J. Seestrom, E. I. Sharapov, M. Singh, Z. Tang, W. F. Uhrich, J. Vanderwerp, P. Walstrom, Z. Wang, A. R. Young. 2024-06-14. An experimental search for an explanation of the difference between beam and bottle neutron lifetime measurements. https://arxiv.org/abs/2406.10378

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