CERN scientists said on Thursday they had recorded sub-atomic particles travelling faster than light, producing a finding that could overturn fundamental law of physics such as one of Einstein's long-accepted special relativity theory.

The international team of scientists are now planning to put the finding to further high-speed tests as if confirmed, the findings could require a revolutionary shift in explaining the workings of the universe.

Only two labs elsewhere in the world can try to replicate the results, and include Fermilab, located outside Chicago and another Japanese lab which has been put on hold by the tsunami and earthquake.

Fermilab officials have met Thursday to discuss the need to help verify the European study and announced their particle beam is already up and running.

There is one problem however since the measuring systems are not nearly as precise as the Europeans' and will not be upgraded for a while, said Fermilab scientist Rob Plunkett.

"This thing is so important many of the normal scientific rivalries fall by the wayside," said Plunkett, a spokesman for the Fermilab team's experiments. "Everybody is going to be looking at every piece of information."

Researchers at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, who announced the discovery Thursday are still said to be amazed and surprised at the discovery.

Antonio Ereditato, spokesman for the team of researchers, told Reuters "We have high confidence in our results. We have checked and rechecked for anything that could have distorted our measurements but we found nothing," he said. "We now want colleagues to check them independently."

If the discovery is confirmed it would challenge Albert Einstein's 1905 theory of special relativity, which contend that the speed of light is a "cosmic constant" and that nothing in the universe can travel faster.

David Fuller's view A potentially momentous scientific discovery increasing the theoretical possibility of time travel. Some of us might welcome the opportunity to travel back through time to change a few earlier decisions, although that might not be good for us from a philosophical standpoint.

Si-fi buffs may be less surprised by this news, having grown up on warp drive.


If only CERN could speed up resolution of the European sovereign debt crisis.