what are quarks ?

abhishek002

i have heard that there are different types of quarks. what are they?
and i would be thankfull for a breif explanation.

mfb

For a general introduction, you might be interested in the wikipedia article or a lecture about particle physics for a more detailed explanation.
A forum is good for specific questions, not for an introduction in broad topics like this.

CloudChamber

Quarks are subatomic particles. They are the building blocks of protons and neutrons, and thus matter in general. They are classified as fermions and carry color charge, mediated by gluons (which are actually bosons) and thus strong force. There are many types, called flavors: strange, charm, up, down, top and bottom.

Whovian

No. Bosons are the force carriers, or, equivalently, those with integer spin. (At least, all force carriers we know about are bosons and vice versa.) Quarks have spin ±1/2, and are thus fermions.

CloudChamber

Oh, of course! Sorry, I was rushing to write this. I see I also spelled neutron "nuetron." Thanks for pointing out my error, I'll edit the post.

daveb

I'm personally a fan of this site.