FUNDAMENTAL PARTICLES

CONTINUED FROM: INTRODUCTION TO FUNDAMENTAL PARTICLES

Nice and simple introduction right? Now lets go down to business. What do we mean by Fundamental particles?

Fundamental Particles can be defined as the smallest, indivisible particles that forms matter and determines their properties and interaction with other matters

(Sounding more like the earlier definition of atoms right? haha)

Anyway, fundamental particles are divided into two groups, namely;
1) The Fermions, and
2) The Boson.

Let's discuss briefly on these two groups before we 'delve' into them fully.

FERMIONS (Matter Forming Particles)
Fermions are like the 'building blocks' of matter. They come together by the help of force carrying particles to make matter.

Fermions are the building blocks of matter.

The Spin of Fermions are always half-integer spins like 1/2, 3/2, 5/2, etc; this makes them able to obey;

a) the Fermi-Dirac Statistics: which in Physics, is the branch of quantum statistics used to calculate the permitted energy arrangements of the particles in a system in terms of the exclusion principle (thefreedictionary.com, 2013), and
b) the Pauli's Exclusion Principle: the quantum mechanical principle which states that no two identical fermions may occupy the same quantum state at the same time (Wikipedia.org, 2013)

BOSONS (Force Carrying Particles)
While fermions as the building blocks, bosons are the 'cementing agents' that holds them together as I mentioned earlier.

Bosons holds matter together.

Bosons were first theorized even before they were observed and even one of them, the graviton, is yet to be observed.
Fermions interacted with each other by exchanging force carrying particles with one another. These force carrying particles are of different natures and strengths and are peculiar to a given type of force.
Bosons have integer spins like 0, 1, 2, 3, etc; and hence they obey;
a) Bose-Einstein Statistics: a version of fermi-dirac statistics that applies to boson.

Note: that the use of the phrase 'cementing agents' to describe bosons does not mean that all of them are as strong as cements. It was used to create a close-enough mental picture.

On my next article, we would go deep into... YOU CHOOSE:
FERMIONS or BOSONS.

Don't Forget to drop your comments and questions.
And if you like it, SHARING is free.
Physics is FUN.

INTRODUCTION TO FUNDAMENTAL PARTICLES

Physics is a broad branch of pure science which 'bothers' itself with the existence of matter and how they interact with each other and space. And now that antimatters have been discovered, that definition would probably be needing a review, hahaha.

But the point I really want to make from this definition is that physics isn't really complete until we answer the question:
WHAT IS MATTER REALLY MADE OF?
Or better put; WHAT ARE THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF MATTER?

It's funny enough to know that some people used to believe that matter was composed of four elements: Water, Fire, Air, and Earth; like you see in the Nickelodeon cartoon series, The Avatar. Some other beliefs added Wood and Metal to the list.

Avatar: The Legend of Korra Characters with the presumed four elements.

Not until science stumbled into the 'indestructible' and 'indivisible' ATOMS. Anyway, we all know that the atom didn't hold those titles for so long; at least, not after we found out that it is made up of some other particles - the SUBATOMIC PARTICLES. These particles includes,
a) The Positively charged Proton;
b) The Negatively charged Electron;
c) and the neutral Neutron.

But, Are we there yet? NO!

All the above mentioned subatomic particles are not fundamental (apart from the electrons - at least for now). It was discovered that the proton and neutron had building elements. These elements has been organized into groups and called FUNDAMENTAL PARTICLES.

And for the rest of this week, I'll spend time to explain these particles one after the other.
Are you ready?

Click to CONTINUE.