Physics:Quantum elementary particle
A quantum elementary particle is a particle with no known smaller constituents. In the Standard Model, elementary particles include quarks, leptons, gauge bosons, and the Higgs boson. Their behavior is specified by quantum fields, spin, mass, charges, and interaction symmetries rather than by internal mechanical parts.[1][2]
Standard Model classification
Elementary matter particles are fermions: six quark flavors and six lepton states when neutrinos are counted by flavor. Interaction carriers include the photon, gluon, W and Z bosons, and the Higgs boson as a scalar field excitation. Antiparticles and internal degrees of freedom such as color charge enlarge the set of physical states observed in reactions.[3][4]
No observed substructure
The phrase elementary does not mean that substructure is logically impossible. It means that no compositeness has been detected at available experimental energies and length scales. Precision scattering, collider searches, magnetic moments, and rare decays test whether a particle behaves as pointlike or has hidden structure.
Quantum numbers
Elementary particles are distinguished by mass, spin, electric charge, color representation, weak isospin, hypercharge, flavor, and parity-related behavior. These quantum numbers determine which interactions are allowed and how particles may decay or scatter.
See also
Table of contents (84 articles)
Index
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References
- ↑ Particle Data Group (2022). "Review of Particle Physics". Progress of Theoretical and Experimental Physics 2022 (8): 083C01. doi:10.1093/ptep/ptac097.
- ↑ Griffiths, David J. (2008). Introduction to Elementary Particles (2nd ed.). Wiley-VCH. ISBN 978-3-527-40601-2.
- ↑ Halzen, Francis; Martin, Alan D. (1984). Quarks and Leptons: An Introductory Course in Modern Particle Physics. Wiley. ISBN 978-0-471-88741-6.
- ↑ Schwartz, Matthew D. (2014). Quantum Field Theory and the Standard Model. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-03473-0.
Source attribution: Physics:Quantum elementary particle