Physicists made the most precise measurement ever of a single particle

By trapping a single electron in an isolated chamber cooled to near absolute zero, physicists were able to measure the particle’s magnetic moment – a key quantum property – at a precision of 1.3 parts in 10 trillion

By Alex Wilkins

A new assessment of the electron is the most precise measurement of a particle ever taken, at a precision of 1.3 parts in 10 trillion, and could tell us about new physics happening at the smallest scales.

The electron’s magnetic moment is a quantum property related to magnetism and is predicted by the standard model, our current understanding of how the basic building blocks of the universe interact. But the standard model is unable to explain certain real-world observations, like dark matter …