INTRODUCTION TO PARTICLE

PHYSICS

Prof. EMMANUEL FLORATOS

PHYSICS DEPT UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS

3rd ANNUAL MEETING

OF PHYSICS GREEK TEACHERS

CERN – 9 NOVEMBER 2015

Web resources
 http://particleadventure.org/index.html
 Especially designed for a very wide audience
 A lot of links from this web page –please try as many as you can
 http://quarknet.fnal.gov/
 Again, a lot of links from this web page – to modern experiments,
and to more practical materials
 http://eddata.fnal.gov/lasso/quarknet_g_activities/det
ail.lasso?ID=18
 This is specific link from the previous web page that I consider
as a most important for implementation of an information about
particle physics into your sillabus
What is particle physics or HEP?
 Particle physics is a branch of physics that studies the elementary
constituents of matter and radiation, and the interactions between
them. It is also called "high energy physics", because many
elementary particles do not occur under normal circumstances in
nature, but can be created and detected during energetic collisions
of other particles, as is done in particle accelerators
 Particle physics is a journey into the heart of matter.
 Everything in the universe, from stars and planets, to us is made
from the same basic building blocks - particles of matter.
Some particles were last seen only billionths of a second after the
Big Bang. Others form most of the matter around us today.
 Particle physics studies these very small building block particles and
works out how they interact to make the universe look and behave
the way it does
 What is the universe made of?
 A very old question, and one that has been approached in
many ways
 The only reliable way to answer this question is by directly
enquiring of nature, through experiments
 not necessarily a “natural human activity”, but perhaps the greatest
human invention
 While it is often claimed that humans display a natural
curiosity, this does not always seem to translate into a
natural affinity for an experimental approach
 Despite hundreds of years of experience, science is not
understood, and not particularly liked, by many people
 often tolerated mainly because it is useful
 Something to think about, especially when we are trying to explain
scientific projects that do not, a priori, seem to be useful
Experiment has taught us:
 Complex structures in the universe are made by
combining simple objects in different ways
 Periodic Table
 Apparently diverse phenomena are often different
manifestations of the same underlying physics
 Orbits of planets and apples falling from trees
 Almost everything is made of small objects that like
to stick together
 Particles and Forces
 Everyday intuition is not necessarily a good guide
 We live in a quantum world, even if it’s not obvious to us
 History of the particle physics
 Modern particle physics began in the early 20th century
as an exploration into the structure of the atom. The
discovery of the atomic nucleus in the gold foil
experiment of Geiger, Marsden, and Rutherford was the
foundation of the field. The components of the nucleus
were subsequently discovered in 1919 (the proton) and
1932 (the neutron). In the 1920s the field of quantum
physics was developed to explain the structure of the
atom. The binding of the nucleus could not be
understood by the physical laws known at the time.
Based on electromagnetism alone, one would expect
the protons to repel each other. In the mid-1930s,
Yukawa proposed a new force to hold the nucleus
together, which would eventually become known as the
strong nuclear force. He speculated that this force was
mediated by a new particle called a meson.
Search for fundamental particles
 Also in the 1930s, Fermi postulated the neutrino as an
explanation for the observed energy spectrum of β-
decay, and proposed an effective theory of the weak
force. Separately, the positron and the muon were
discovered by Anderson. Yukawa's meson was
discovered in the form of the pion in 1947. Over time, the
focus of the field shifted from understanding the nucleus
to the more fundamental particles and their interactions,
and particle physics became a distinct field from nuclear
physics.
 Throughout the 1950-1960’s, a huge variety of additional
particles was found in scattering experiments. This was
referred to as the "particle zoo".
 Are protons and neutrons fundamental?
 To escape the "Particle Zoo," the next logical step was to investigate
whether these patterns could be explained by postulating that all
Baryons and Mesons are made of other particles. These particles
were named Quarks
 As far as we know, quarks are like points in geometry.
They're not made up of anything else.
 After extensively testing this theory, scientists now
suspect that quarks and the electron (and a few
other things we'll see in a minute) are fundamental.
 An elementary particle or fundamental particle is a
particle not known to have substructure; that is, it is not
known to be made up of smaller particles. If an
elementary particle truly has no substructure, then it is
one of the basic particles of the universe from which all
larger particles are made.
 Scale of the atom
 While an atom is tiny, the nucleus is ten
thousand times smaller than the atom and
the quarks and electrons are at least ten
thousand times smaller than that. We don't
know exactly how small quarks and
electrons are; they are definitely smaller
than 10-18 meters, and they might literally be
points, but we do not know.
 It is also possible that quarks and electrons
are not fundamental after all, and will turn
out to be made up of other, more
fundamental particles.
 Fundamental blocks
 Two types of point like constituents
Leptons Quarks

e 1 u d
 2 c s
 3 t b
 Plus force carriers (will come to them later)
 For every type of matter particle we've found, there also
exists a corresponding antimatter particle, or
antiparticle.
 Antiparticles look and behave just like their
corresponding matter particles, except they have
opposite charges.
 Generations of quarks and leptons
 Note that both quarks and leptons exist in
three distinct sets. Each set of quark and
lepton charge types is called a generation
of matter (charges +2/3, -1/3, 0, and -1 as
you go down each generation). The
generations are organized by increasing
mass.
 All visible matter in the universe is made
from the first generation of matter particles -
- up quarks, down quarks, and electrons.
This is because all second and third
generation particles are unstable and
quickly decay into stable first generation
particles.
Spin: a property of particle
 Spin is a value of angular momentum assigned to all
particles. When a top spins, it has a certain amount of
angular momentum. The faster it spins, the greater the
angular momentum. This idea of angular momentum is
also applied to particles, but it appeared to be an
intrinsic, unchangeable property. For example, an
electron has and will always have 1/2 of spin.
 In quantum theories, angular momentum is measured in
units of h = h/2p = 1.05 x 10-34 Js (Max Planck). (Js is
joule-seconds, and is pronounced "h bar.")
 Classification of particles according to spin:
 Fermions: have spin ½
 Bosons: : have spin 1
 Scalar particles: have spin = 0
Quarks
 Most of the matter we see around us is made from
protons and neutrons, which are composed of up and
down quarks.
 There are six quarks, but physicists usually talk about
them in terms of three pairs: up/down, charm/strange,
and top/bottom. (Also, for each of these quarks, there is
a corresponding antiquark.)
 Quarks have the unusual characteristic of having a
fractional electric charge, unlike the proton and electron,
which have integer charges of +1 and -1 respectively.
Quarks also carry another type of charge called color
charge, which we will discuss later.
Quantum numbers of quarks
Type of quark Charge Spin

u (up) +2/3 1/2

d (down) -1/3 1/2

s (strange), S = 1 -1/3 1/2

c (charm), C =1 +2/3 1/2

b (bottom), B = 1 -1/3 1/2

t (top) +2/3 1/2

 Fractional charges and unseen quarks
 Murray Gell-Mann and George Zwieg proposed the idea of
the quarks to find some order in the chaos of particles:
 baryons are particles consisting of three quarks (qqq),
 mesons are particles consisting of a quark and anti-quark (q q-bar).
qqq Q S Bar. qqbar Q S Mes.
uuu 2 0 Δ++ uubar 0 0 0
uud 1 0 Δ+ udbar 1 0 +
udd 0 0 Δ0 ubar d -1 0 -
ddd -1 0 Δ- ddbar 0 0 η
uus 1 -1 Σ*+ uus 1 -1 K+
uds 0 -1 Σ*0 uds 0 -1 K0
dds -1 -1 Σ*- dds -1 -1 K-
uss 0 -2 Ξ*0 uss 0 -2 K0
dss -1 -2 Ξ*0 dss -1 -2 η’
sss -1 -3 Ω-
 Fractional charges and unseen quarks
 Problems arose with introducing quarks:
 Fractional charge – never seen before
 Quarks are not observable
 Not all quark combinations exist in nature
 It appears to violate the Pauli exclusion principle
 Originally was formulated for two electrons.
 Later realized that the same rule applies to all particles with spin ½.
 Consider D++(uuu): is supposed to consist of three u quarks in the
same state – inconsistent with Pauli principle!
Color charge of quarks (1)
 So one had to explain why one saw only those
combinations of quarks and antiquarks that had integer
charge, and why no one ever saw a q, qq, qqqbar, or
countless other combinations.

 Gell-Mann and others thought that the answer had to lie

in the nature of forces between quarks. This force is the
so-called "strong" force, and the new charges that feel
the force are called "color" charges, even though they
have nothing to do with ordinary colors.
Color charge of quarks (2)
 They proposed that quarks can have three color
charges. This type of charge was called "color" because
certain combinations of quark colors would be "neutral"
in the sense that three ordinary colors can yield white, a
neutral color.
 Only particles that are color neutral can exist, which is
why only qqq and q q-bar are seen.
 This also resolve a problem with Pauli principle
Just like the combination of red and blue gives
purple, the combination of certain colors
give white. One example is the combination of
red, green and blue.
Summary of L.1
 There are 6 quarks and 6 leptons which we believe
are fundamental blocks of nature
 They have antiparticles, i.e. the same quantum
numbers except electric charge
 Quarks have fractional electric charges
 A new charge for quarks has been introduced: this
charge is color
 Forces
Although there are apparently many types of forces in the
Universe, they are all based on four fundamental forces:
Gravity, Electromagnetic force, Weak force and Strong force.

The strong and weak forces only act at very short distances and
are responsible for holding nuclei together.

The electromagnetic force acts between electric charges.

The gravitational force acts between masses.

Pauli's exclusion principle is responsible for the tendency of

atoms not to overlap each other, and is thus responsible for the
"stiffness" or "rigidness" of matter, but this also depends on the
electromagnetic force which binds the constituents of every
atom.
 Forces
All other forces are based on these four. For example,
friction is a manifestation of the electromagnetic force
acting between the atoms of two surfaces, and the Pauli
exclusion principle, which does not allow atoms to pass
through each other.

The forces in springs modeled by Hooke’s law are also the

result of electromagnetic forces and the exclusion principle
acting together to return the object to its equilibrium
position.

Centrifugal forces are acceleration forces which arise

simply from the acceleration of rotating frames of reference
Forces at the fundamental level
 The particles (quarks and leptons) interact through
different “forces”, which we understand as due to the
exchange of “field quanta” known as “gauge bosons”.

Electromagnetism (QED) Photon (γ) exchange

Strong interactions (QCD) Gluon (g) exchange
Weak interactions W and Z bosons exchange
Gravitational interactions Graviton (G) exchange ?
Forces
 The Standard Model describes the interaction of quarks and leptons
via these gauge bosons.
 There is also postulated but not yet discovered scalar (i.e. spin of
this particle = 0)
 What's the difference between a force and an interaction?
 This is a hard distinction to make. Strictly speaking, a force is the
effect on a particle due to the presence of other particles. The
interactions of a particle include all the forces that affect it, but
also include decays and annihilations that the particle might go
through. (We will spend the next chapter discussing these
decays and annihilations in more depth.)
 The reason this gets confusing is that most people, even most
physicists, usually use "force" and "interaction" interchangeably,
although "interaction" is more correct. For instance, we call the
particles which carry the interactions force carrier particles. You
will usually be okay using the terms interchangeably, but you
should know that they are different.
Exchange forces
 You can think about forces as being analogous to the following
situation:
 Two people are standing in boats. One person moves their arm and
is pushed backwards; a moment later the other person grabs at an
invisible object and is driven backwards. Even though you cannot
see a basketball, you can assume that one person threw a
basketball to the other person because you see its effect on the
people.

 It turns out that all interactions which affect matter particles are due
to an exchange of force carrier particles, a different type of particle
altogether. These particles are like basketballs tossed between
matter particles (which are like the basketball players). What we
normally think of as "forces" are actually the effects of force carrier
particles on matter particles.
Exchange forces
 We see examples of attractive forces in everyday life (such as
magnets and gravity), and so we generally take it for granted that an
object's presence can just affect another object. It is when we
approach the deeper question, "How can two objects affect one
another without touching?" that we propose that the invisible force
could be an exchange of force carrier particles. Particle physicists
have found that we can explain the force of one particle acting on
another to INCREDIBLE precision by the exchange of these force
carrier particles.
 One important thing to know about force carriers is that a particular
force carrier particle can only be absorbed or produced by a matter
particle which is affected by that particular force. For instance,
electrons and protons have electric charge, so they can produce and
absorb the electromagnetic force carrier, the photon. Neutrinos, on
the other hand, have no electric charge, so they cannot absorb or
produce photons.
 Range of forces
The range of forces is related to the mass of exchange particle M.
An amount of energy ΔE=Mc2 borrowed for a time Δt is governed
by the Uncertainty Principle:
DE  Dt ~ 
The maximum distance the particle can travel is Δx = c Δt, where c
is velocity of light.
Dx  c / DE
Dx  c / Mc 2
The photon has M=0  infinite range of EM force.
W boson has a mass of 80 GeV/c2  Range of weak force is
197 MeV fm/ 8x105 MeV = 2x10-3 fm
Which forces act on which particles?
 The weak force acts between all quarks and leptons
 The electromagnetic force acts between all charged
particles
 The strong force acts between all quarks (i.e. objects
that have color charge)
 Gravity does not play any role in particle physics

Weak EM Strong

Quarks + + +
Charged leptons + + –
Neutral leptons + – –
Electromagnetism
 The electromagnetic force causes like-charged things to
repel and oppositely-charged things to attract. Many
everyday forces, such as friction, are caused by the
electromagnetic, or E-M force. For instance, the force that
keeps us from falling through the floor is the
electromagnetic force which causes the atoms making up
the matter in our feet and the floor to resist being
displaced.

 Photons of different energies span the electromagnetic

spectrum of x rays, visible light, radio waves, and so forth.
 Residual EM force
 Atoms usually have the same numbers of protons and
electrons. They are electrically neutral, because the positive
protons cancel out the negative electrons. Since they are
neutral, what causes them to stick together to form stable
molecules?
 The answer is a bit strange: we've discovered that the charged
parts of one atom can interact with the charged parts of another
atom. This allows different atoms to bind together, an effect
called the residual electromagnetic force.
 So the electromagnetic force is what
allows atoms to bond and form
molecules, allowing the world to stay
together and create the matter. All the
structures of the world exist simply
because protons and electrons have
opposite charges!
What about nucleus?
 We have another problem with atoms, though. What
binds the nucleus together?
 The nucleus of an atom consists of a bunch of protons
and neutrons crammed together. Since neutrons have no
charge and the positively-charged protons repel one
another, why doesn't the nucleus blow apart?
 We cannot account for the nucleus staying together with
just electromagnetic force. What else could there be?
Strong interactions
 To understand what is happening inside the nucleus, we need to
understand more about the quarks that make up the protons and
neutrons in the nucleus. Quarks have electromagnetic charge, and
they also have an altogether different kind of charge called color
charge. The force between color-charged particles is very strong, so
this force is "creatively" called strong.
 The strong force holds quarks together to form hadrons, so its
carrier particles are whimsically called gluons because they so
tightly "glue" quarks together.
 Color charge behaves differently than electromagnetic charge.
Gluons, themselves, have color charge, which is weird and not at all
like photons which do not have electromagnetic charge. And while
quarks have color charge, composite particles made out of quarks
have no net color charge (they are color neutral). For this reason,
the strong force only takes place on the really small level of quark
interactions.
 Color charge
 There are three color charges and three corresponding anticolor
(complementary color) charges. Each quark has one of the three
color charges and each antiquark has one of the three anticolor
charges. Just as a mix of red, green, and blue light yields white light,
in a baryon a combination of "red," "green," and "blue" color charges
is color neutral, and in an antibaryon "antired," "antigreen," and
"antiblue" is also color neutral. Mesons are color neutral because
they carry combinations such as "red" and "antired.“
 Because gluon-emission and -absorption always changes color, and
-in addition - color is a conserved quantity - gluons can be thought of
as carrying a color and an anticolor charge. Since there are nine
possible color-anticolor combinations we might expect nine different
gluon charges, but the mathematics works out such that there are
only eight combinations. Unfortunately, there is no intuitive
explanation for this result.
Color charge (2)
 When two quarks are close to one another, they
exchange gluons and create a very strong color force
field that binds the quarks together. The force field gets
stronger as the quarks get further apart. Quarks
constantly change their color charges as they exchange
gluons with other quarks.

g
q q

Anti-red-green gluon transforms the

red quark into the green quark
 Quark Confinement
 Color confinement is the physics phenomenon that color charged
particles like quarks cannot be isolated. Quarks are confined with other
quarks by the strong interaction to form pairs of triplets so the net color
is neutral. The force between quarks increases as the distance
between them increases, so no quarks can be found individually.
 As any of two electrically-charged particles separate, the electric
fields between them diminish quickly, allowing electrons to become
unbound from nuclei.
 However, as two quarks separate, the gluon fields form narrow
tubes (or strings) of color charge) – quite different from EM!
 Because of this behavior, the color force experienced by the quarks
in the direction to hold them together, remains constant, regardless
of their distance from each other.
 Since energy is calculated as force times distance, the total
energy increases linearly with distance.
Quark Confinement (2)
 When two quarks become separated, as happens in accelerator
collisions, at some point it is more energetically favorable for a new
quark/anti-quark pair to "pop" out of the vacuum.

 In so doing, energy is conserved because the energy of the color-

force field is converted into the mass of the new quarks, and the
color-force field can "relax" back to an unstretched state.
 Residual strong force
 So now we know that the strong force binds quarks together because
quarks have color charge. But that still does not explain what holds
the nucleus together, since positive protons repel each other with
electromagnetic force, and protons and neutrons are color-neutral.
 The answer is that, in short, they don't call it the strong force for
nothing. The strong force between the quarks in one proton and the
quarks in another proton is strong enough to overwhelm the repulsive
electromagnetic force

 This is called the residual strong interaction, and it is what "glues" the
nucleus
Weak interactions
 There are six kinds of quarks and six kinds of leptons.
But all the stable matter of the universe appears to be
made of just the two least-massive quarks (up quark and
down quark), the least-massive charged lepton (the
electron), and the neutrinos.
 It is the only interaction capable of changing flavor.
 It is mediated by heavy gauge bosons W and Z.
 Due to the large mass of the weak interaction's carrier particles
(about 90 GeV/c2), their mean life is limited to 3x10-25 s by the
Uncertainty principle. This effectively limits the range of weak
interaction to 10-18 m (1000 times smaller than the diameter of an
atomic nucleus)
 It is the only force affecting neutrinos.
Weak interactions (2)
 Since the weak interaction is both very weak and very
short range, its most noticeable effect is due to its other
unique feature: flavor changing.
 Consider a neutron n(udd) b-decay.
Although the neutron is heavier than
its sister proton p(uud), it cannot
decay to proton without changing the
flavor of one of its down quarks d.
 Neither EM nor strong interactions
allow to change the flavor changing,

n  p  e  e
so that must proceed through weak
interaction.
 Here d  u  W  u  e  e
Gravity
 Gravitons are postulated because of the great success
of the quantum field theory at modeling the behavior of
all other forces of nature with similar particles: EM with
the photon, the strong interaction with the gluons, and
the weak interaction with the W and Z bosons. In this
framework, the gravitational interaction is mediated by
gravitons, instead of being described in terms of curved
spacetime like in general relativity.
 Gravitons should be massless since the gravitational
force acts on infinite distances.
 Gravitons should have spin 2 (because gravity is a
second-rank tensor field)
 Gravitons have not been observed so far.
 For particle physics, it is very weak interaction to worry
about.
Introduction
 One of the most striking general properties of elementary
particles is their tendency to disintegrate.
 Universal principle: Every particle decays into lighter
particles, unless prevented from doing so by some
conservation law.
 Obvious conservation laws:
 Momentum conservation
 Energy conservation
 Charge conservation
 Stable particles: neutrinos, photon, electron and proton.
 Neutrinos and photon are massless, there is nothing to decay for
them into
 The electron is lightest charged particle, so conservation of
charge prevents its decay.
 Why proton is stable?
Baryon number
 Baryon number: B  ( n q n q ) 3
 all baryons have baryon number +1, and antibaryons have baryon
number -1. The baryon number is conserved in all interactions,
i.e. the sum of the baryon number of all incoming particles is the
same as the sum of the baryon numbers of all particles resulting
from the reaction.
For example, the process p  e   does not violate the


conservation laws of charge, energy, linear momentum, or angular
momentum. However, it does not occur because it violates the
conservation of baryon number, i.e., B = 1 on the left and 0 on the
right. It is fortunate that this process "never" happens, since
otherwise all protons in the universe would gradually change into
positrons! The apparent stability of the proton, and the lack of
many other processes that might otherwise occur, are thus
correctly described by introducing the baryon number B together
with a law of conservation of baryon number.
 However, having stated that protons do not decay, it must also be
noted that supersymmetric theories predict that protons actually do
decay, although with a half-life of at least 1032 years, which is
longer than the age of the universe. All attempts to detect the
decay of protons have thus far been unsuccessful.
Lepton Number
 Lepton number: L n  n
 leptons have assigned a value of +1, antileptons −1, and non-
leptonic particles 0. Lepton number (sometimes also called
lepton charge) is an additive quantum number.
 The lepton number is conserved in all interactions, i.e. the
sum of the lepton number of all incoming particles is the
same as the sum of the lepton numbers of all particles
resulting from the reaction.
Other quantum numbers
 Strangeness: S N s  N s is a property of particles,
expressed as a quantum number for describing decay of
particles. Strangeness of anti-particles is referred to as +1,
and particles as -1 as per the original definition.
 Strangeness is conserved in strong and electromagnetic
interactions but not during weak interactions.
 DS=1 in weak interactions. DS>1 are forbidden.
 Charm: C Nc  Nc
 Charm is conserved in strong and electromagnetic interactions, but
not in weak interactions. DC=1 in weak interactions.
 Examples of charm particles: D meson contains charm quark and
Ds meson contains c and s quarks, J/ is (cc) combination,
charmonium; Baryon (but not the only one): c contains both s and
c quarks
 What governs the particle decay? (1)
 Each unstable particle has a characteristic mean lifetime.
Lifetime  is related to the half-life t1/2 by the formula t1/2=(ln 2) =
0.693. The half-time is the time it takes for half the particles in a
large sample to disintegrate.
 For muons μ it’s 2.2x10-6 sec, for the + it’s 2.6X10-8 sec; for 0
it’s 8.3x10-17 sec.
 Most of the particles exhibit several different decay modes
 Example: 63.4% of K+’s decay into μ++μ, but 21% go to ++0,
5.6% to ++++- and so on.
 One of the goals of the elementary particle physics is to
calculate these lifetimes and branching ratios
 A given decay is governed by one of the 3 fundamental forces:
 Strong decay: Δ++  p+ + +
 EM decay: 0 + 
 Weak decay: Σ-  n + e + e
Branching fractions
 In particle physics, the branching fraction for a decay is
the fraction of particles which decay by an individual
decay mode with respect to the total number of particles
which decay. It is equal to the ratio of the partial decay
constant to the overall decay constant. Sometimes a
partial half-life is given, but this term is misleading; due
to competing modes it is not true that half of the particles
will decay through a particular decay mode after its
partial half-life.
What governs the particle decay? (2)
 Momentum/energy conservation law in particle
physics. Example: is decay 0(uds)- + p+ allowed?
 m = 1116 MeV ; mp = 938 MeV ; m = 140 MeV, so m>mp+m
and decay is allowed. Q = m – mp – m = 38 MeV, so the total
kinetic energy of the decay products must be Kp+K = 38 MeV.
Using relativistic formula for kinetic energy, we can write this as
K p  K  p 2p  m2p  m p  p2  m2  m  38MeV

 Conservation of of momentum requires pp = p.

 The kinetic energies can be found: Kp = 33 MeV, K = 5 MeV
 Feynman diagrams
 Feynman diagrams are graphical ways to represent exchange forces. Each
point at which lines come together is called a vertex, and at each vertex one
may examine the conservation laws which govern particle interactions. Each
vertex must conserve charge, baryon number and lepton number.
 Developed by Feynman to describe the interactions in quantum
electrodynamics (QED), the diagrams have found use in describing a variety
of particle interactions. They are spacetime diagrams, ct vs x. The time axis
points upward and the space axis to the right. Particles are represented by
lines with arrows to denote the direction of their travel, with antiparticles
having their arrows reversed. Virtual particles are represented by wavy or
broken lines and have no arrows. All electromagnetic interactions can be
described with combinations of primitive diagrams like this one.
 Feynman diagrams
 Only lines entering or leaving the diagram
represent observable particles. Here two
electrons enter, exchange a photon, and
then exit. The time and space axes are
usually not indicated. The vertical direction
indicates the progress of time upward, but
the horizontal spacing does not give the
distance between the particles.
 After being introduced for electromagnetic
processes, Feynman diagrams were
developed for the weak and strong
interactions as well. Forms of primitive
vertices for these three interactions are
Examples of Feynman diagrams
Feynman diagrams for some decays (1)
 Consider decay Δ0 p + -: This is
strong decay, i.e. it occurs due to
emission of gluon by one of the d-
quarks in D0 baryon. The emitted
gluon does not change the flavor of
the quark, so we still have a d-quark
in the final state (it went to pion). Then
this gluon is split into two quarks, u
and anti-u. The u-quark combines with
initial u and d quarks in D0, and this
leads to arising of a proton, p. The
anti-u quark combines with d quark
and together they form a negatively
charged pion.
 Feynman diagrams for some decays (2)
 Consider decays + ++ and
0 p + -: In both cases one of the
quarks changed its flavor via emitting
a charged W boson. This is the main
feature of the weak interactions, so
these decays are weak decays.
 In both cases we have a virtual W
bosons, i.e. they arise for a very short
time and decay.
 As you can see, W boson can decay
into a pair of leptons (first case) or
into a pair of quarks (second
diagram)
Feynman diagrams for some decays (3)
 Consider decay S0 0+: In
this case the quark composition
does not change. So it is not a
weak decay. It is also not a strong
decay – it does not involve any
exchange with gluons. So this is
radiative decay, that is caused by
EM force.
 In general, having a photon in the
final state means that we have an
electromagnetic decay – usually
call them radiative decays.
Which decays are allowed?
 S0    0
 S0(uds), (uds), 0(u ubar). M(S) = 1197.45 MeV, M() = 1115.68
MeV, M(0) = 134.98 MeV;
 S-  n + -
 S(dds), n(udd), (ubar d ). M(S) = 1197.45 MeV, M(n) = 939.56
MeV, M(-) = 139.57 MeV ;
 Ξ0 - +p
 uss, ubar d, uud correspondingly. M(Ξ0) =1314.83 MeV , M(p) =
938.27 MeV
 Ξ-  - + 
 dss, ubar d, uds correspondingly. M(Ξ-) =1321.31 MeV
 N  e + -
 M(e) = 0.511 MeV
Parity
 One of the conservation laws which applies to particle
interactions is associated with parity.
 Quarks have an intrinsic parity which is defined to be +1
and for an antiquark parity = -1. Nucleons are defined to
have intrinsic parity +1. For a meson with quark and
antiquark with antiparallel spins (s=0), then the parity is
given by P  Pq Pq (1)  , where l = orbital angular
momentum.
 The meson parity is given by P (1)  (1)1
 The lowest energy states for quark-antiquark pairs
(mesons) will have zero spin and negative parity and are
called pseudoscalar mesons. The nine pseudoscalar
mesons can be shown on a meson diagram. One kind of
notation for these states indicates their angular
momentum and parity J P  01
 Parity (2)
 Excited states of the mesons occur in
which the quark spins are aligned, which
with zero orbital angular momentum
gives j=1. Such states are called vector
1
mesons, J P
 1
 The vector mesons have the same spin
and parity as photons.
 All neutrinos are found to be “left-
handed", with an intrinsic parity of -1
while antineutrinos are right-handed,
parity =+1.
 Parity conserves in strong and EM
interactions, but not in weak interactions.
 Non-conservation of parity
 The electromagnetic and strong interactions are
invariant under the parity transformation. It was a
reasonable assumption that this was just the way
nature behaved, oblivious to whether the coordinate
system was right-handed or left-handed. In 1956, T.
D. Lee and C. N. Yang predicted the non-
conservation of parity in the weak interaction. Their
prediction was quickly tested when C. S. Wu and
collaborators studied the b-decay of Cobalt-60 in
1957.
 By lowering the temperature of cobalt atoms to about
0.01K, Wu was able to "polarize" the nuclear spins
along the direction of an applied magnetic field. The
directions of the emitted electrons were then
measured. Equal numbers of electrons should be
emitted parallel and antiparallel to the magnetic field
if parity is conserved, but they found that more
electrons were emitted in the direction opposite to the
magnetic field and therefore opposite to the nuclear
spin.
Non-conservation of parity
 This and subsequent experiments have consistently
shown that a neutrino always has its intrinsic angular
momentum (spin) pointed in the direction opposite its
velocity. It is called a left-handed particle as a result.
Anti-neutrinos have their spins parallel to their velocity
and are therefore right-handed particles. Therefore we
say that the neutrino has an intrinsic parity.
 When non-conservation of parity was discovered,
theorists tried to “fix” the problem assuming that physics
laws are invariant under CP transformations
 CP is the product of two symmetries: C for charge
conjugation, which transforms a particle into its
antiparticle, and P for parity, which creates the mirror
image of a physical system.
CP symmetry and its violation
 CP violation is a violation of the postulated CP symmetry
of the laws of physics. It plays an important role in
theories of cosmology that attempt to explain the
dominance of matter over antimatter in the present
Universe. The discovery of CP violation in 1964 in the
decays of neutral kaons resulted in the Nobel Prize in
Physics in 1980 for its discoverers James Cronin and Val
Fitch. The study of CP violation remains a vibrant area of
theoretical and experimental work today.
 The strong interaction and electromagnetic interaction
seem to be invariant under the combined CP
transformation operation, but this symmetry is slightly
violated during certain types of weak decay. Historically,
CP-symmetry was proposed to restore order after the
discovery of parity violation in the 1950s
CP violation
 Overall, the symmetry of a quantum mechanical system can be
restored if another symmetry S can be found such that the combined
symmetry PS remains unbroken. This rather subtle point about the
structure of Hilbert space was realized shortly after the discovery of
P violation, and it was proposed that charge conjugation was the
desired symmetry to restore order.
 Simply speaking, charge conjugation is a simple symmetry between
particles and antiparticles, and so CP symmetry was proposed in
1957 by Lev Landau as the true symmetry between matter and
antimatter. In other words a process in which all particles are
exchanged with their antiparticles was assumed to be equivalent to
the mirror image of the original process
 In 1964, James Croninand Val Fitch provided clear evidence that
CP symmetry could be broken, too. Their discovery showed that
weak interactions violate not only the charge-conjugation symmetry
C between particles and antiparticles and the P or parity, but also
their combination. .
CP violation
 The kind of CP violation discovered in 1964 was linked to the fact
that neutral kaons can transform into their antiparticles (in which
each quark is replaced with its antiquark) and vice versa, but such
transformation does not occur with exactly the same probability in
both directions; this is called indirect CP violation.
 Only a weaker version of the symmetry could be preserved by
physical phenomena, which was CPT symmetry. Besides C and P,
there is a third operation, time reversal (T), which corresponds to
reversal of motion. Invariance under time reversal implies that
whenever a motion is allowed by the laws of physics, the reversed
motion is also an allowed one. The combination of CPT is thought to
constitute an exact symmetry of all types of fundamental
interactions. Because of the CPT-symmetry, a violation of the CP-
symmetry is equivalent to a violation of the T-symmetry. CP violation
implied nonconservation of T, provided that the long-held CPT
theorem was valid. In this theorem, regarded as one of the basic
principles of quantum field theory, charge conjugation, parity, and
time reversal are applied together.
CPT invariance (1)
 Many of the profound ideas in nature manifest
themselves as symmetries. A symmetry in a physical
experiment suggests that something is conserved, or
remains constant, during the experiment. So
conservation laws and symmetries are strongly linked.
 Three of the symmetries which usually, but not always,
hold are those of charge conjugation (C), parity (P), and
time reversal (T):
 Charge conjugation (C) : reversing the electric charge and
all the internal quantum numbers.
 Parity (P): space inversion; reversal of the space
coordinates, but not the time.
 Time reversal (T): replacing t by -t. This reverses time
derivatives like momentum and angular momentum.
CPT invariance (1)
 P, CP symmetries are violated in weak interaction. We are left with
the combination of all three, CPT, a profound symmetry consistent
with all known experimental observations.
 On the theoretical side, CPT invariance has received a great deal of
attention. Georg Ludens, Wolfgang Pauli and Julian Schwinger
independently showed that invariance under Lorentz transformations
implies CPT invariance. CPT invariance itself has implications which
are at the heart of our understanding of nature and which do not
easily arise from other types of considerations.
 Integer spin particles obey Bose-Einstein statistics and half-
integer spin particles obey Fermi-Dirac statistics. Particles and
antiparticles have identical masses and lifetimes. This arises from
CPT invariance of physical theories.
 All the internal quantum numbers of antiparticles are opposite to
those of the particles.
CP violation and matter/antimatter
 The CPT Theorem guarantees that a particle and its anti-particle
have exactly the same mass and lifetime, and exactly opposite
charge. Given this symmetry, it is puzzling that the universe does
not have equal amounts of matter and antimatter. Indeed, there is no
experimental evidence that there are any significant concentrations
of antimatter in the observable universe.
 There are two main interpretations for this disparity: either when the
universe began there was already a small preference for matter, with
the total baryonic number of the universe different from zero; or, the
universe was originally perfectly symmetric (B(time = 0) = 0), but
somehow a set of phenomena contributed to a small imbalance. The
second point of view is preferred, although there is no clear
experimental evidence indicating either of them to be the correct
one.
The Sakharov conditions
 In 1967, Andrei Sakharov proposed a set of three necessary
conditions that a baryon-generating interaction must satisfy to
produce matter and antimatter at different rates.
 Baryon number B violation. – Do not have any experimental
confirmations
 C-symmetry and CP-symmetry violation. – Observed experimentally
 Interactions out of thermal equilibrium.
 The last condition states that the rate of a reaction which generates
baryon-asymmetry must be less than the rate of expansion of the
universe. In this situation the particles and their corresponding
antiparticles do not achieve thermal equilibrium due to rapid
expansion decreasing the occurrence of pair-annihilation.

 There are competing theories to explain this aspect of the

phenomena of baryogenesis, but there is no one consensus theory to
explain the phenomenon at this time
Event displays from OPAL experiment at LEP

In the first event, the decay of a Z boson into a pair of muons is seen.
The muons are identified by their penetration right through the detector.
 Event displays from OPAL experiment at LEP

A similar event is shown here but in this case a photon has been emitted
by one of the muons, shown as a cluster in the electromagnetic
calorimeter with no associated track.
Event displays from OPAL experiment at LEP

The Z boson may also decay to a

pair of quarks. As the quarks
move apart, the energy in the
field between them caused by
their "colour" charge builds up
and further quarks and
antiquarks are formed. Finally,
the quarks are seen in the
detector as two collimated back-
to-back "jets" of hadrons (bound
states of quarks and antiquarks),
as in this event
Event displays from OPAL experiment at LEP

Sometimes, an energetic
gluon (a quantum of the
colour field) may be emitted
by one of the quarks. In an
event like this, a third jet may
be seen. The study of events
like these allow us to test the
theory of the strong
interactions, Quantum
ChromoDynamics (QCD).
 Production cross section (1)
 The strength of a particular interaction between two particles is specified by
interaction cross section.
 The concept of cross section is the crucial key that opens the
communication between the real world of experiment and the abstract,
idealized world of theoretical models. The cross section is the probability that
an interaction will occur between a projectile particle and a target particle,
which could be an antiproton, or perhaps a proton or neutron in a piece of
metal foil.
 We can measure the probability that two particles will interact in
experiments. We can also calculate this quantity in a model that incorporates
our understanding of the forces acting on a subatomic level. In the famous
experiment in which Rutherford studied the scattering of alpha particles off a
foil target, the cross section gives the probability that the alpha particle is
deflected from its path straight through the target. The cross section for
large-angle scattering is the fraction of alpha particles that bounce back from
the target, divided by the density of nuclei in the target and the target
thickness. The comparison of the measured cross section with the
calculated one verified the model of the atom with a massive center,
carrying an electrical charge.
 Production cross section (2)
 We can picture the cross section as the effective area that a target presents
to the projected particle. If an interaction is highly probable, it's as if the
target particle is large compared to the whole target area, while if the
interaction is very rare, it's as if the target is small. The cross section for an
interaction to occur does not necessarily depend on the geometric area of a
particle. It's possible for two particles to have the same geometric area
(sometimes known as geometric cross section) and yet have very different
interaction cross section or probability for interacting with a projectile
particle.
 During wartime research on the atomic bomb, American physicists who were
bouncing neutrons off uranium nuclei described the uranium nucleus as "big
as a barn." Physicists working on the project adopted the name barn for a
unit equal to 10-24 square centimeters, about the size of a uranium nucleus.
Initially they hoped the American slang name would obscure any reference
to the study of nuclear structure; eventually, the word became a standard
unit in particle physics.
 Proof of color (1)
 SLAC (SPEAR), Brookhaven lab (p on Be) and Cambridge Electron
Accelerator were measuring R
 R is ratio of the production cross sections to hadrons and to muons
R   (e e  qq ) /  (e e      )

3 stands for number of colors!

 R should be 2 for low

energies, where we have u,
d, s quarks: R =
3x(1/9+1/9+4/9) = 3x2/3 =2
Proof of color (2)
 Another example of the effect of color is in the neutral
pion decay 0.
 Dominant graph is the triangle diagram:
0 u 
u
u 

 In this case colors involved in the decay are not

distinguishable, so the three amplitudes should be added
coherently, and the rate acquires a factor Nc2=9.
 Theory predicts G(02)=7.73 eV, experimentally
measured G(02)=7.7  0.6 eV
 If Nc would be 1, the theoretical prediction would be 9
times smaller.
 Proof of three generations of leptons
 Z boson can decay to
hadrons and leptons.
 Z boson can decay to the
pair of neutrino and
antineutrino.
 Since neutrinos assumed
to be massless or at least
have very small masses,
we can try to use this fact
to determine number of
neutrino flavors  Theoretical prediction for the Z
(corresponding leptons boson width (it depends on number
might be heavy, so Z might of neutrino flavors) and experimental
not have enough mass to data obtained at LEP.
decay into pair of such  Agreement with assumption of 3
leptons flavors of netrinos  3 generations.
Introduction
 By 1960’s a lot of particles were discovered
 In 1964, Gell-Mann has proposed a model that explained
all particles as consisting of three types of quarks, u,d and
s, and their anitquarks.
 But in 1970’s, there was a problem with the flavor
changing decay of K0L(ds):

 Measured decay rate

turned out to be
much smaller
compared to the
predicted
Theoretical prediction
 To fix the problem, Glashow, Illiopolus and Maiani have
suggested to introduce the fourth quark named charm (c)
quark.
 So we have to add another diagram into calculation of the
Kμ+μ¯ decay.

 These two diagrams

almost completely
compensate each
other, and we do not
see this decay.
 Now, how we can
prove that c quark
exists?
 R and new quarks
 SLAC (SPEAR), Brookhaven lab (p on Be) and Cambridge Electron
Accelerator were measuring R
 Ratio R   (e e  qq ) /  (e e      )

 At low energies, R = 2
confirming that all particles
produced at these energies
consist of 3 quarks.
 As energy increases, new
quarks can be created from
vacuum, resulting in
increase of R
Discovery of J/
 A new particle has been discovered in 1974 by two
independent experiments at SLAC and Brookhaven.
SLAC: e e   hadrons
 


e e ,    
 SLAC called it 

 BNL: p  Be  J /  anything
ee
 BNL team called it J (after Ting?)
 This is the only particle that has double name
Discovery of J/
 These are original plots
showing the observation of
the J/ resonance with mass
of 3.1 GeV/c2. Here (a)
 
corresponds to case e e  qq
(b) e  e       and
(c) e  e   e  e 
 One can see that this
resonance is well pronounced
in all channels and peak is at
the same mass
 Why they were sure that this
particle has charm and anti-
charm quarks?
What is the quark composition of J/ ?
Particle Mass JP, I Γ, MeV Branching ratio
J/ 3097.88  0.04 1-,0 0.087 Hadrons 88%
Lifetime e +e- 6%
~10-20 sec +- 6%

 The extreme narrowness of the J/ resonance in

comparison with those of other meson resonances
indicated that there was no possibility of understanding
them in terms of u, d, s quarks only.
 The mass of the particle was extremely large compared to
masses of known particles.
 A new type of quark postulated by GIM in 1970  this
particle is a combination of ccbar - charmonium
Some details about J/
 Charmonium is a bound state of a charmed quark
and antiquark
 The attractive force between them has two pieces
 A Coulomb-like part, which dominates at short distances
 A spring-like part, which dominates at long distances
 The charmonium wavefunctions
 Are Hydrogen-atom like
 Can be described with H-atom like quantum numbers, e.g. 3S1
 Drive the production properties
 Charmonium production
 Is not a simple story
 Semi-Classical Quark Confinement
Yesterday’s not-too-terrible model of the quark-antiquark force law:

A spring-like part
A
F  2  Br This piece comes from the non-
Abelian nature of QCD: the fact that
r you have 3-gluon and 4-gluon
couplings.
A Coulomb-like part
In QED, there is no  coupling, so
this term is absent
 Charmonium states
 As the mass of the charmed quark is quite large, the
velocities of the c and cbar in a bound state are small
enough that many important features of these states
can be described using non-relativistic potential
models. Also, at typical separations of the quark and
antiquark, the shape of the ccbar potential is somewhat
like that of the Coulomb potential. Hence, many
features of ccbar states - collectively called
charmonium - are familiar from the physics of the
hydrogen atom, or more precisely, from the
spectroscopy and dynamics of positronium, a bound
state of an electron and a positron.
 The charmonium spectrum provides fundamental
information about the nature of the strong force holding
quarks together.
 Charmonium states
 After its discovery, the J/ψ was soon
identified as a 3S1 ccbar bound
state, that is, a spin-triplet (S = 1) S-
wave (L = 0) level with total spin
J = 1. Several other ccbar levels
were observed soon after. This
figure illustrates the low-mass
charmonium spectrum and the
principal transitions between
charmonium states expected from
the analogy of ccbar states with
positronium states. Among the low-
mass states expected, only the
ηc(2S), an excited version of the
ηc(1S), and the hc, a spin-singlet P-
wave 1P1 level, steadfastly refused
to make significant appearances,
despite reported sightings that were
not confirmed.
Importance of charmonium studies
 If current ideas about the nature of the interquark force
are correct, the mass of the hc, M(hc), is expected to be
near the average of the masses of the χcJ levels,
〈M(3PJ)〉 ≈ 3525 MeV/c2. This prediction for M(hc) is
based on the expectation that the dominant spin-
dependent interquark force is Coulomb-like, as predicted
by quantum chromodynamics (QCD).
 Charm and charmonium data taken at CLEO by year
2005 include a sample of slightly more than
3 million ψ(2S) decays. The ψ(2S) data were used to
search for the transition ψ(2S) → 0hc.
 Analyses of this inclusive signature yielded
M(hc) = 3524.9±0.7±0.4 MeV/c2 in good agreement
with expectations
Examples of other charmed particles
 Decay of D+ meson: D  K  e  e
 0 

 D+(cd), mass M(D+) = 1869.7 MeV, mean lifetime t = 1.04x10-12 sec

 K0(ds), mass M(K0) = 497.7 MeV
 Decay of c baryon:  c  p  K 0
 c(udc) – lightest charmed baryon.
 What about c     K 0 decay? Is it allowed?
 Can +c decay strongly, i.e. via strong interactions only?
 Decay of Sc baryon: Scc+0 – what kind of the
decay is that?