What I had in mind is assume we have a particle and an anti-particle and we want to switch between them.Orodruin said:What do you mean by ”transform”? Without any other particles partaking in the process? In that case no, that would violate particle number.
Clarification: It is possible for some neutral particles.DrDu said:For neutral particles, this is possible, see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutral_particle_oscillation
Well don't neutral particles have zero charge and thus they are their own anti-particle?DrDu said:For neutral particles, this is possible, see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutral_particle_oscillation
Take a hydrogen atom which is neutral. If you invert the charge of both the electron and proton, you get an anti-hydrogen, which is evidently not equal to a hydrogen atom, although it is also neutral.MathematicalPhysicist said:Well don't neutral particles have zero charge and thus they are their own anti-particle?
If the answer to the above question is 'correct', then that's not what I was looking for.
No, this is incorrect. Neutral particles are not necessarily their own anti-particles, although it is a prerequisite for that to be the case.MathematicalPhysicist said:Well don't neutral particles have zero charge and thus they are their own anti-particle?
If the answer to the above question is 'correct', then that's not what I was looking for.
Well, hydrogen does not oscillate into anti-hydrogen (in the standard model) so it may be more instructive to discuss the kaons from your previous post. Neutral kaons are combinations of ##s\bar d## and ##d\bar s##.DrDu said:Take a hydrogen atom which is neutral. If you invert the charge of both the electron and proton, you get an anti-hydrogen, which is evidently not equal to a hydrogen atom, although it is also neutral.
I think that was the point. Not everything neutral is its own antiparticle.Orodruin said:Well, hydrogen does not oscillate into anti-hydrogen (in the standard model) so it may be more instructive to discuss the kaons from your previous post. Neutral kaons are combinations of ##s\bar d## and ##d\bar s##.
I thought the point of the OP was to ask whether particles can transform into anti-particles. For that it is naturally necessary that the particle is different from the anti-particle. The point of #5 was to say that this does indeed happen for (some) neutral particles, but the example of #8 is not one of those cases, but the kaon is.mfb said:I think that was the point. Not everything neutral is its own antiparticle.
The neutron is another example. Antineutrons are different particles.
Yes, according to the principles of quantum mechanics, a particle can transform into its counter anti-particle, also known as its antiparticle or antiparticle state. This process is known as particle-antiparticle annihilation.
A particle can transform into its counter anti-particle through a process called pair production, which occurs when a high-energy particle interacts with a vacuum or another particle. The high energy of the initial particle is converted into mass, creating a particle-antiparticle pair.
Particle-antiparticle annihilation is significant because it is one of the ways that energy can be created from matter and vice versa. It is also a crucial process in understanding the behavior of subatomic particles and the fundamental forces of the universe.
Yes, antiparticles can exist in nature and are observed in high-energy particle collisions and cosmic rays. They are also created in small amounts in radioactive decays and in particle accelerators.
The main difference between a particle and an antiparticle is their electric charge. A particle has a positive or negative charge, while its corresponding antiparticle has the opposite charge. They also have opposite magnetic moments and can have different masses, although they have the same rest mass.