Six Superheavy Gluons: Fact or Fiction?

[Vorde]

I read some time ago in a book on physics (I believe it was A Brief History of Time, but I can't be sure) that mentioned how the current model for particle physics had the 16 particles of the standard model, plus six superheavy gluons that are far too massive to ever be witnessed. Am I misremembering this or is this true? And if so then why can't I find any mention of them anywhere?

 

[phinds]

I read some time ago in a book on physics (I believe it was A Brief History of Time, but I can't be sure) that mentioned how the current model for particle physics had the 16 particles of the standard model, plus six superheavy gluons that are far too massive to ever be witnessed. Am I misremembering this or is this true? And if so then why can't I find any mention of them anywhere?

Just off the top of my head, that sounds absolutely wrong. I think all of the particles in the standard model have been seen experimentally except for the Higgs boson.

 

[phinds]

yes, I was right. Try this:

http://www.google.com/search?btnG=1...ndard+model+have+been+observed+experimentally

and check out the 2nd article (wikipedia)

 

[Constantin]

Those six superheavy gluons are clearly not part of the standard model.

Also any particle being "far too massive to ever be witnessed" is an obviously wrong statement. If it will never be witnessed, then it doesn't exist.

 

[Vorde]

I looked through A Brief History of Time, wasn't in there. It's possible I'll figure out where I read it in and update this thread but for now it's a safe assumption I'm misremembering something.

Thank you all though.

 

[Constantin]

Try this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimal_Supersymmetric_Standard_Model

Supersymmetric models have lots of heavy additional particles.

 

[Bill_K]

You're probably thinking of the SU(5) Grand Unified Theory by Georgi-Glashow. This has, in addition to the usual particles, a pair of superheavy bosons named X and Y. The X and Y carry color charge and form a weak doublet, and therefore couple to other particles through both the strong and weak interactions. Counting three colors for each, this would work out to six additional particles. The X boson has a charge of -4/3, while the Y boson has a charge of -1/3. The mass of each would be in the range of 10¹⁵ GeV/c². They would cause proton decays, such as p → π⁰ + e⁺, which have not been observed.