What motions do quarks make in a particle?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the motions and interactions of quarks within particles, particularly focusing on their behavior in nucleons. Participants explore concepts such as quark trajectories, orbital angular momentum, and the nature of quark interactions, including the role of gluons.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Technical explanation

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants suggest that quarks exhibit a 'jitter' motion and question whether they spin around one another or have an orbital relationship.
  • One participant notes that, similar to electrons in atoms, quarks do not have defined trajectories.
  • There is mention of controversy regarding the orbital angular momentum of quarks in nucleons, with a request for more information on this topic.
  • Another participant points out that the differing rest masses of quarks in a neutron lead to a complex charge distribution, despite the neutron having no net charge.
  • One contribution discusses the recent advancements in understanding quark interactions and the concept of forces acting on quarks, drawing parallels to electron density around atomic nuclei.
  • A participant speculates that gluons facilitate interactions between quarks, suggesting that quarks may not exist as independent entities but rather as part of a dynamic 'soup'.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express multiple competing views regarding the nature of quark motion and interactions, indicating that the discussion remains unresolved with no consensus reached.

Contextual Notes

The discussion highlights the complexity of quark dynamics and the limitations in current understanding, particularly regarding the definitions and implications of orbital angular momentum and quark interactions.

h20 bear
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I understand that they 'jitter'. Do they spin around one another or have some sort of 'orbit' in respect to each another? Is it chaotic?

Do they actually touch one another?
 
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Like electrons in atoms, they don't have trajectories.
 
The question for the "orbital angular momentum of quarks in a nucleon" is somewhat controversial as far as I am informed. Does anyone know something more on this issue?
 
I know that because quarks in neutron have different rest masses, there is a non-trivial distribution of charge around the neutron (even it has no net charge).
 
Dickfore said:
The question for the "orbital angular momentum of quarks in a nucleon" is somewhat controversial as far as I am informed. Does anyone know something more on this issue?
A good account more or less up-to-date is in :
Understanding the proton's spin structure

Although electrons do not orbit like planets, we can still plot electronic densities around nuclei and molecules. It is not a mere "visualization", those are almost directly the root of chemical properties. Only recently (during the last decade or so) we have been able to construct the analog for light relativistic quarks. We now can give a strict meaning to the concept of "force" acting on a quark (not just waving our hands). A more formal account of the theory behind and its subtleties is in
Angular Momentum Decomposition for an Electron
 
I may be shot down soon (I doesn't hurt THAT much), but I believe the gluons between the quarks move across between quark to quark, with color changes and other things going on, such that even though "on average" there are two up quarks and one down quark, or vice versa, the quarks are not actually really there in terms of being independent "objects", but rather more like a soup.
 

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