The pi meson...

[pf21avs]

Hello everyone, I am a senior physics student doing a paper on the pi meson. The only real website I can find with relevant information towards it is on wikipedia. I don't really want to use that as a source because of the credibility issue which arises with wiki. So I was wondering, (even tried google and found definition websites) if you could had any websites which has thorough information on the discoverers, how it was discovered and how it fits into the standard model. That would be really helpful. BTW I have a week to complete this so help would be preferable ASAP. Any helpful books which could be useful would be great too. Any replies would be very much appreciated but I understand you guys have other things to do so I won't be disappointed if you don't. Thanks.

P.s. my email address is pf21avs@hotmail.com if anyone wants to get personally in touch with me

[Rade]

Try these links, the second gives a nice history of the pi-meson (aka pion):
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/particles/hadron.html
http://books.google.com/books?id=oJJILIL6q_IC&dq=history+of+physics+of+pion&pg=PA48&ots=VDqM8l8DkR&sig=n0p4Xsnl2e-JC3jkCm4zb-5b4Yc&prev=http://www.google.com/search%3Fq%3Dhistory%2Bof%2Bphysics%2Bof%2Bpion%26 btnG%3DSearch%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D&sa=X&oi=print&ct=result&cd=3#PPP1,M1
http://fafnir.phyast.pitt.edu/particles/pion.html

You need to read : H. Yukawa, Proc. Phys. Math. Soc. Japan 17, 48 (1935).

Here is a summary of what Yukawa found:
http://www4.prossiga.br/Lopes/prodcien/birth/Birth3.html#14

And how pi-meson hypothesis of Yukawa is viewed today:
http://ej.iop.org/links/rg6_g1rli/5pzuKN6k2xGD3vRyav5vpA/jpconf5_20_013.pdf

[chroot]

Any textbook on modern or particle physics should have all the info you could possibly want. Have you tried a local university library?

- Warren

[pf21avs]

Chroot im a senior high school student. I don't understand enough of the text in University Particle Physics books to make any sense of what I'm reading. Maybe I shouldn't have assumed senior meant grade 12... sorry guys.

[pf21avs]

BUMP... anyone want to try and tackle this task?

[cesiumfrog]

Perhaps you need to specify exactly why none of the references you've already been offered are sufficient.

[Meir Achuz]

The pi meson was discussed more thoroughly in old particle physics texts than in newer ones. I suggest you try tthe library for books by
(I m not sure of the exact names of the books):
Perkins, 1st edition
Bruno Rossi
Emilio Segre
Fermi: Nuclear Physics
Sam Lindenbaum

[Ki Man]

Writing essays on quarks while still in high school? your school funding must be on steroids:rolleyes:

are you planning on having alot of equations and whatnot in your essay or is it going to be more of a background history type of report

[pf21avs]

its more of a thorough essay without any equations, how do we know it exists, what evidence is there of it, how ti fits into the standard model, how was it discovered, in what type of accelerator and with what detection apparatus

[pf21avs]

One question for the guys on here. I seem to find a lot of website that state that pi mesons are the carriers of the strong force... but isn't taht the job of the gluons and their continous colour exchange? I am getting really confused and frustrated ebcause this essay is due in like 5 days and I have yet to start because I DON'T UNDERSTAND what the pion is and reliable sources for it. I am going to go to the library tomrorow and see if I can find those books though. They'll probably be helpful. BUt if anyone can answer that question it would do wonders for me. Thanks guys.

[jtbell]

I seem to find a lot of website that state that pi mesons are the carriers of the strong force... but isn't taht the job of the gluons and their continous colour exchange?

Quarks exchange gluons, but nucleons (protons and neutrons, which are bound triplets of quarks) exchange bound quark-antiquark pairs (pi mesons). At least at "low" energies, such as are involved in holding a nucleus together. If you smack two nucleons together with a lot of energy, then the individual quarks in one nucleon start to interact directly with the quarks in the other nucleon.

[pf21avs]

Quarks exchange gluons, but nucleons (protons and neutrons, which are bound triplets of quarks) exchange bound quark-antiquark pairs (pi mesons). At least at "low" energies, such as are involved in holding a nucleus together. If you smack two nucleons together with a lot of energy, then the individual quarks in one nucleon start to interact directly with the quarks in the other nucleon.

So then is the duty shared? Where low energy equals pions and high energies equals gluons?

[pf21avs]

Bump.. Sorry for tryin to keep this at the top of the forum but I have no actual reason I'm just selfishly trying to get this done.

[jtbell]

Words are slippery things. Trying to be careful about it, I would say that exchange of gluons among quarks is the fundamental mechanism for the strong interaction, in all cases. In some situations, namely low-energy interactions of protons and neutrons, and maybe of other hadrons, this fundamental interaction manifests itself as pion exchange.

In this picture, if you take a Feynman diagram of, say, a proton-neutron interaction involving pion exchange, it should be possible to re-draw it in terms of quarks and gluons, with triplets of quark lines replacing the proton and neutron, and a pair of quark/antiquark lines replacing the pion. Before I wrote my previous post, I did a Google search on "pion exchange" and found an article that discusses this connection and contains an example of such a diagram:

Peter Dunne, A reappraisal of the mechanism of pion exchange and its implications for the teaching of particle physics (http://teachers.web.cern.ch/teachers/archiv/HST2002/feynman/Pion%20exchange.pdf), Physics Education 3 (37), p. 211 (May 2002).