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At very high energies, however, around ~100 GeV (or

approximately 10 times the ambient energy at room


temperature), the weak nuclear force and the
electromagnetic force quite clearly become two different
manifestations of the same fundamental force. You might
ask, then, if its possible that at even higher energies, the
other forces unify? The first one to consider is the strong
nuclear force, since its also a part of the Standard Model
like the electromagnetic and the weak force. There are a
few facts that seem to support this idea:
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. The charges of the proton (governed by the strong force) and the electron (governed by the
electromagnetic) cancel exactly, hinting that there might be some symmetry there.

. The coupling constants for the strong, weak and electromagnetic forces, which change as a
function of energy, almost meet at one single, high-energy point if you extrapolate to
higher energies.

. And the additional physics that this unification brings along with it allows potential solutions
to problems like why neutrinos have small-but-nonzero masses and why the Universe
has a matter-antimatter asymmetry.

An asymmetry between the bosons and anti-bosons common to grand unified theories like
SU(5) unification could give rise to a fundamental asymmetry between matter and antimatter,
similar to what we observe in our Universe. Image credit: E. Siegel.

Its an incredible, tantalizing idea. In fact, before string


theory was the major theoretical game in town, grand
unification and grand unified theories (GUTs) were all the
rage. But there are some big problems with these ideas,
too. For one, the new particles that were predicted were of
hopelessly high energies: around 10 to 10 GeV, or
trillions of times the energies the LHC produces. For
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another, almost all of the GUTs you can design lead to


particles undergoing flavor-changing-neutral-currents,
which are certain types of decays forbidden in the
Standard Model and never observed in nature. Another
prediction of almost all GUTs is the existence of proton
decay, on timescales of around ~10 years. You might
think, since our Universe is only around 14 billion years
old, this isnt a concern. But if you can get ~10 protons
together and wait one year, you should see a decay,
because decays work probabilistically.
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The water-filled tank at Super Kamiokande, which has set the most stringent limits on the
lifetime of the proton. Image credit: Kamioka Observatory, ICRR (Institute for Cosmic Ray
Research), The University of Tokyo.

Detectors like Kamiokande and its successors are sensitive


to this exact type of decay, and we fill them with water
(containing two protons in the form of hydrogen atoms for
every molecule) and wait. Weve determined,
experimentally, that if the proton does decay, it has a
lifetime of at least ~10 years, meaning that most GUTs
including the simplest one are ruled out. And the story
gets worse from there, if you take a skeptical look at the
facts. The single point that the three forces almost meet
at only looks like a point on a logarithmic scale, when you
zoom out. But so do any three mutually non-parallel lines;
you can try it for yourself by drawing three line segments,
extending them in both directions until they all intersect,
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and then zooming out. The small-but-nonzero masses for


neutrinos can be explained by any see-saw mechanism
and/or by the MNS matrix; theres nothing special about
the one arising from GUTs. And the explanation for the
matter-antimatter asymmetry would result in an
overproduction of magnetic monopoles as well, which
are not observed to exist in our Universe.
The only positive detection for a candidate Magnetic Monopole came in 1982; all subsequent
searches have come up empty. Image credit: Cabrera B. (1982). First Results from a
Superconductive Detector for Moving Magnetic Monopoles, Physical Review Letters, 48 (20)
13781381.

It may still turn out that grand unification is correct, and


that its an important step on the road to a Theory Of
Everything: the ultimate holy grail of many theoretical
physicists. But it may also turn out that nature doesnt
unify at high energies, and that our biases towards
simplicity, elegance and more unification is completely
wrongheaded and has nothing to do with our physical
Universe. In science, as in all things, we cannot afford to
be driven by our own preconceptions of how things ought
to be. Rather, we owe ourselves to view the Universe
exactly as it is, and to listen to the story it tells us about
itself. It might not be comforting, especially initially, but
other than the motivation brought on by electric charges
being the same across quarks, leptons and bosons, theres
no compelling reason to think grand unification is

anything other than a theoretical curiosity and a physical


dead-end.

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