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Protons and Neutrons


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Is it agreed among physicists that the proton is not really made up of just 2 up quarks and 1 down quark? It is really made up of an unknown but extremely large number of up, down, charmed and strange quarks, plus gluons and that on average there are two extra up quarks and a down quark? Does this account for all the particle that are produces when they are collided at the LHC.

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Protons and neutrons have been shown to act like 'bags' containing three particles in scattering experiments.

The masses of the individual quarks account for only a couple of percent of the proton's or neutron's mass, the rest can be thought of as binding energy. Recall how much energy must be supplied to separate quarks ( actually impossible, you just generate more pairs ), all this 'extra' mass-energy is available to create all sorts of particles in collisions.

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You are right that the neutron and proton are not simply made of three quarks and some gluons. Really the nucleons are a "boiling pot" of particles coming in and out of existence; this is what quantum field theory tells us.

 

Overall we have what looks like three quarks bound together.

 

Anyway, you should not think of the particles that emerge from collider experiments as already being present in the initial particles. What is present is the energy to create such particles.

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You are right that the neutron and proton are not simply made of three quarks and some gluons. Really the nucleons are a "boiling pot" of particles coming in and out of existence; this is what quantum field theory tells us.

 

Overall we have what looks like three quarks bound together.

 

Anyway, you should not think of the particles that emerge from collider experiments as already being present in the initial particles. What is present is the energy to create such particles.

 

Is this "boiling pot" of particles coming in and out of existence in neutrons and protons the so-called virtual particles that come in and out of existence in the vacuum of empty space?

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Is this "boiling pot" of particles coming in and out of existence in neutrons and protons the so-called virtual particles that come in and out of existence in the vacuum of empty space?

 

Yes, there us plenty of space in a nucleon for this. A basic question could be how many gluons are "inside" a proton?

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Yes, there us plenty of space in a nucleon for this. A basic question could be how many gluons are "inside" a proton?

 

 

Question?Should I be thinking of gluons as particles or as a field of virtual particles.

 

Inputting energy by trying to pull the quarks apart,results in the gluon creating new particles.

Edited by derek w
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  • 3 weeks later...

Anyway, you should not think of the particles that emerge from collider experiments as already being present in the initial particles. What is present is the energy to create such particles.

How do we know anti-proton have this component? Have we done the same experiment about anti-protons? Does it only come from our calculation or imagination?

 

particleconcep2.jpg

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How do we know anti-proton have this component? Have we done the same experiment about anti-protons? Does it only come from our calculation or imagination?

 

 

 

I think that the structure of antiprotons has also been probed in deep inelactic scattering experiments. You will have to hunt for details yourself.

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