Something I always wondered about electroweak theory

[ilocar]

the whole concept, I just don't get it. really its the unification I don't really understand. does flavor turn into charge? or is it some strange wave thing. does that mean that light takes on weak properties at high energy levels? or is there a new kind of light (like an electroweak wave?) and how does weak force fit into right-hand rule and inductance, or does that break down at the quantum level? thanks in advance for your wisdom.

 

[malawi_glenn]

You can write the weak- and the EM interaction as one single term, a field with U(1)xSU(2) gauge invariance, the fields are then B, W_1, W_2, W_3. The W_1 = W+ and W_2 = W- (the ordinary W-bosons) and The photon and the Z boson is a linear combination of B and W_3. At high energies, the photon and Z boson interactions takes place at same rate and same strength.

For instance
e+e- -> virtual photon -> e+e-
e+e- -> Virtual Z -> e+e-

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1979/

You can read each winners lecture

 

[Abbas Sherif]

the whole concept, I just don't get it. really its the unification I don't really understand. does flavor turn into charge? or is it some strange wave thing. does that mean that light takes on weak properties at high energy levels? or is there a new kind of light (like an electroweak wave?) and how does weak force fit into right-hand rule and inductance, or does that break down at the quantum level? thanks in advance for your wisdom.

Put simply, at high energies, the carriers(photons and W+- Z or massive vector bosons) behave the same. They are in the same phase and exhibit the same properties. Quarks and photons are the same thing. If we could give a name we could just say they are Quarph(not including the strong interaction and gravity here). The symmetry will breakdown at lower energies since this is when the MVBs acquire their masses.

Simple though.

 

[humanino]

If we could give a name we could just say they are Quarph(not including the strong interaction and gravity here).

Ouarf ?

 

[Vanadium 50]

Quarks and photons are the same thing.

Absolutely untrue.

 

[malawi_glenn]

Ouarf ?

hypothetical superpartner to quarks in very exotic SUSY models

or just a typo

 

[Vanadium 50]

I think he's trying to say quarks and photons become the same thing and is coining his own word for it.

 

[humanino]

I think he's trying to say quarks and photons become the same thing and is coining his own word for it.

But in order for this to make sense, you (IMHO) probably need ALL known particles to be the same, as in string theory. Even supersymmetry by itself is not enough. So my "ouarf" amounted to "that's quite a long shot".

 

[Abbas Sherif]

Absolutely untrue.

I quote again "at the proposed high energies (on the oreder of 100Gev), quarks and photons are indistinguishible and are the same according to the Salam-Weinberg theory" . You can check this with any website ob book on particle physics. And by the way thanks for clarifying the point that I meant to say quarks and photons are the same and was quoting my own word for it(please this is no word to be used,just some silly stuff).

 

[malawi_glenn]

I quote again "at the proposed high energies (on the oreder of 100Gev), quarks and photons are indistinguishible and are the same according to the Salam-Weinberg theory" . You can check this with any website ob book on particle physics. And by the way thanks for clarifying the point that I meant to say quarks and photons are the same and was quoting my own word for it(please this is no word to be used,just some silly stuff).

I have 10 books on elementary particle physics, it is a good manner to say WHERE the quote are coming from!

 

[benk99nenm312]

I quote again "at the proposed high energies (on the oreder of 100Gev), quarks and photons are indistinguishible and are the same according to the Salam-Weinberg theory" . You can check this with any website ob book on particle physics. And by the way thanks for clarifying the point that I meant to say quarks and photons are the same and was quoting my own word for it(please this is no word to be used,just some silly stuff).

Maybe I don't have enough experience to say this, but how in the world does a quark and a photon ever appear or become the same? Photons have no rest mass and spin 1. Quarks have a non-zero rest mass and spin 1/2. I'm just a little curious here...

And salem Weinberg Theory is just another name for electroweak theory, right? Well, if so, I looked on the Internet and I haven't found anything that verifies what you are saying.

 

[ilocar]

I think he got massive vector bosons confused with Quarks, or something to that effect. Although, theoretically, if string theory is correct then wouldn't all matter act the same if you got hot enough? becouse it would all just be "String" right?

 

[benk99nenm312]

I think he got massive vector bosons confused with Quarks, or something to that effect. Although, theoretically, if string theory is correct then wouldn't all matter act the same if you got hot enough? becouse it would all just be "String" right?

The matter woudn't vibrate the same. Spin 2 stays spin 2, and so forth, I believe.