Particles Flashcards
What is the Nucleon Number?
Mass Number - protons and neutrons -
What is the symbol for the Nucleon Number?
A
What is the Proton Number?
Atomic Number - number of protons -
What is the Symbol for the Proton Number?
Z
What is the Nuclide notation?
Summarises all the information about an elements atomic structure.
What is the Specific Charge of a particle?
The ratio of its charge to its mass.
What is the unit for Specific Charge?
C Kg*-1
How do you calculate the Specific Charge?
Divide the Charge (C) by the Mass (Kg).
What is an isotope?
An atom with a Same number of Protons, but a changing number of neutrons.
What do isotopes effect?
The stability of the atom.
What is isotopic data?
The relative amounts of the different isotopes of an element present in a substance.
Example of isotopic data?
Carbon-14 is in most living things, so when they die, scientists can calculate the age of the object by finding the percentage if radioactive carbon-14 that’s left in the object.
What are the four forces in the nucleus?
Electromagnetic Force.
Gravitational Force.
Strong Force.
Weak Force.
What is the Electromagnetic Force?
Causes the positively charges protons in the nucleus to repel each other.
What is the Gravitational Force?
Causes all the nucleons in the nucleus to attract each other due to their mass.
What is the Strong Force?
The attractive force that holds the nucleus together.
What is Beta - Decay?
The emission of an electron from the nucleus along with an antineutrino particle.
When a nucleus ejects a beta particle, one of the neutrons in the nucleus is changed into a proton.
What is the electromagnetic spectrum?
A continuous spectrum of all the possible frequencies of electromagnetic radiation.
The frequency of a wave is the number of complete waves passing a point per second.
The wavelength is the distance between two adjacent crests of a wave.
The higher the frequency of electromagnetic radiation, the greater the energy.
What are photons?
Discrete packets of electromagnetic waves and the energy it carries
What is an antiparticle?
Every particle has a corresponding antiparticle with the same mass, but different charge.
What are some examples of anti particles?
Proton and Antiproton.
Neutron and Antineutron.
Electron and Positron.
Neutrino and Antineutrino.
All of which has the same mass and rest energies, but different charges.
What is pair production?
When energy is turned into mass, you get equal amounts of matter and antimatter.
Pair production only happens if there is enough energy to produce the masses of the particles.
What are Hadrons?
Made up from quarks.
There are two types of Hadrons - mesons and baryons.
Feel the Strong Nuclear Force.
What are Baryons?
Type of Hadron.
The Proton and Neutron (nucleons) are both types of Baryon.
What is the Baryon Number?
A quantum number that must always be conserved. It tells you the number of baryons.
What are examples of Baryon Numbers?
Protons, neutrons and other baryons, have a baryon number of +1.
Anti-baryons (Antiproton) has a baryon number of -1.
Other particles that aren’t baryons , such as electrons, have a baryon number of 0.
What are Mesons.
Type of Hadron.
Unstable.
What are the types of Mesons?
Pions - the exchange particles of the nuclear force , that has 3 different charges.
Kaons - More unstable than pions, and decay into pions.
What are leptons?
Fundamental Particles (not composed of other particles).
Do not feel the Strong Force.
They react with other particles via the weak interaction.
Electrons and Muons are types of Lepton
What is the lepton number?
A quantum number to identify leptons.
What are strange particles?
Created via the strong interaction.
Strange particles can only be created in pairs.
What is strangeness?
Similarly to the Baryon number, Strangeness is a quantum number.
Strangeness can be found in Kaons, with K+ having a strangeness of +1 and K- having a strangeness of -1.
What properties have to be conserved in particle reactions?
Charge.
Baryon Number.
Lepton Number.
Strangeness.
Energy.
Momentum.
Name the 3 types of Quark.
Up.
Down.
Strange.
What are the properties of the 3 types of Quark?
Up:
symbol = u
Charge = +2/3
Baryon Number = +1/3
Strangeness = 0
Down:
Symbol = d
Charge = -1/3
Baryon Number = +1/3
Strangeness = 0
Strange:
Symbol = s
Charge = -1/3
Baryon Number = +1/3
Strangeness = -1
What are the properties of Antiquarks?
opposite properties to the Quarks.
What is the Quark composition of Baryons?
Baryons are made up of 3 different types of Quarks:
uud
udd
anti (uud)
anti (ddu)
What is the Quark composition of Mesons?
All mesons are made up from one quark and one antiquark.
Pions:
π⁺ = u and anti (d)
π⁻ = d and anti (u)
π⁰ = u and anti (u)
π⁰ = d and anti (d)
Kaons:
K+ = u and anti (s)
K− = s and anti (u)
K0 = s and anti (d)
K0 = d and anti (s)
What is Quark Confinement?
It is impossible to get a quark by itself.
If you were to blast a proton with a lot of energy, the quark will not be removed, instead the energy would turn into matter.
What is Particle exchange?
All forces are caused by particle exchange.
Exchange particles interact with particles to produce the effects of attraction or repulsion.
What is Repulsion?
Imagine two skaters on ice throwing a ball, and every time they throw/catch the ball they get pushed further apart as the ball carries momentum.
The skaters represent particles interacting with each other, and the ball is the exchange particle that causes a repulsive force.
What is Attraction?
Imagine two skaters on ice facing away throwing a boomerang, and every time the boomerang is thrown/caught they get pushed together.
The Skaters are the interacting particles and the boomerang in the exchange particle.
What are Exchange particles?
How the forces act between two particles - know as virtual particles.
Virtual particles last for a short amount of time - long enough to transfer energy, momentum and other properties.
The repulsion of protons are caused by the exchange of virtual photons (electromagnetic force).
All Forces are caused by the 4 fundamental forces, each one has its own exchange particles , named gauge bosons.
