What Role Did Electrons and Positrons Play in the Early Universe?

[narrator]

I've been reading about the early universe (The book: The First Three Minutes) and it prompted a few questions:

Is it right that a dominant part of the early universe was electrons and positrons?

Given that electrons and positrons were a big part of the early universe, was there some early process whereby they ended up becoming masses (or just the positrons did)? I'm trying to understand how the balance in numbers of electrons, protons and neutrons came about.

I find it difficult to get my head around a particle having no mass (photons). Is it that their mass is so insignificantly small, compared to protons and neutrons, that their mass has no measurable effect? Or is it that they actually do have zero mass?

Edited to correct something I misread. Apologies.

 

[bcrowell]

Is it right that a dominant part of the early universe was electrons and positrons?

I think that's right: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lepton_epoch

Given that electrons and positrons were a big part of the early universe, was there some early process whereby they ended up becoming masses (or just the positrons did)?

Electrons and positrons do have mass. Particles with mass can be created out of pure energy: E=mc².

I'm trying to understand how the balance in numbers of electrons, protons and neutrons came about.

The universe has zero total charge, and charge is conserved. One example of a mixture of particles that has zero total charge is a mixture of electrons, positrons, neutrinos, and photons (as in the lepton epoch). Another example is a mixture of protons, neutrons, electrons, neutrinos, and photons (the part of today's mix that we understand well). Mix #1 existed at early times because the temperature was high enough to produce electron-positron pairs spontaneously.

I find it difficult to get my head around a particle having no mass (photons). Is it that their mass is so insignificantly small, compared to protons and neutrons, that their mass has no measurable effect? Or is it that they actually do have zero mass?

Empirically, we can set a very low limit on their mass:
R.S. Lakes, "Experimental limits on the photon mass and cosmic magnetic vector potential", Physical Review Letters 80 (1998) 1826, http://silver.neep.wisc.edu/~lakes/mu.html
Note that massless particles still gravitate, basically because their energy is equivalent to some mass by E=mc². There was an era when gravity in our universe was mainly due to photons: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation-Dominated_Era

-Ben

 

[narrator]

Thanks Ben, thanks for your comprehensive reply. :)

The universe has zero total charge, and charge is conserved.

Do we know this for certain? My memory of chemistry is that unstable chemicals change often because of movement of uneven charges. (I recall some man made chemicals were difficult to maintain for this reason.) Could it be that the BB had some provocation from such an imbalance?

Particles with mass can be created out of pure energy: E=mc².

I've often wondered about this process. Is it quantum machinery that does this? (Trying to form a picture in my mind of how it might happen - energy pushing quantum particles together or some such.)

I think that's right: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lepton_epoch

I noted from the link in that article to Leptons, this quote: "Charged leptons can combine with other particles to form various composite particles such as atoms and positronium."

Which made me wonder. If Leptons were the dominant species, then there were fewer "other particles" at that time. Which means more "other particles" must have been created by the process you mentioned, mass out of energy. Is that right? Was that the annihilation process?

 

[bcrowell]

Do we know this for certain? My memory of chemistry is that unstable chemicals change often because of movement of uneven charges. (I recall some man made chemicals were difficult to maintain for this reason.) Could it be that the BB had some provocation from such an imbalance?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge_conservation

I've often wondered about this process. Is it quantum machinery that does this?

No, it's a purely classical (i.e., non-quantum mechanical) fact.

Which made me wonder. If Leptons were the dominant species, then there were fewer "other particles" at that time. Which means more "other particles" must have been created by the process you mentioned, mass out of energy. Is that right? Was that the annihilation process?

The main change has not been that leptons and antileptons have been annihilated with each other.

The questions you're asking make me think you could get a lot out of reading The First Three Minutes.

-Ben

 

[narrator]

The questions you're asking make me think you could get a lot out of reading The First Three Minutes.

hehe.. I'm reading it, a dozen pages at a time.. but you're right