BRAINCAKEQuarks
Quarks are fundamental particles that make up hadrons. There are six flavours, in three generations:
• up (u) and down (d)
• charm (c) and strange (s)
• top (t) and bottom (b)
Their charges (in units of e, the charge on a proton):
• u, c and t: +2/3
• d, s and b: –1/3
Every quark has a baryon number of +1/3. Ordinary matter is made of up and down quarks only; the heavier quarks appear in high-energy collisions and cosmic rays.
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Key terms in this lesson
- baryon number
- A quantum number assigned +1 to baryons, -1 to antibaryons and 0 to other particles, conserved in every interaction.
More in Particle Physics
- Particles and Antiparticles
- Pair Production
- Annihilation
- The Standard Model
- Leptons
- Baryons and Mesons
- Quark Composition of Hadrons
- Conservation Laws in Particle Interactions
All 19 lessons in Particle Physics · All Edexcel A-level Physics topics