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CP violation means that the symmetry between matter and anti-matter
is imperfect.
And this is pretty obvious to anyone who looks around the universe and notices
that anti-matter is quite rare.
However the discovery in 1964 of CP violation
still came as a huge surprise to most particle phycisists.
The C in CP violation stands for charge conjugation,
which takes a
particle into anti-particle.
The P stands for parity transformation
which creates a mirror image
changing right-handed screw ino
a left-handed screw.
And the combination of C & P
changes matter into anti-matter. For example, a spin-up electron
would become a spin-down positron.
Now, if CP were a perfect symmetry,
then right after the big *** equal numbers of particles and anti-particles
would have
annihilated each other
leaving nothing.
Uh... Because of CP violation, about one particle in a hundred million was left
over,
and it produced the world as we observe it today.
However. CP violations in weak interactions, as particle physicists have measured in
experiments
is not nearly enough to account
for the observed a asymmetry between matter and anti-matter.