Elementary particle

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In particle physics, an elementary particle is a particle not made up of smaller particles. All elementary particles are either bosons or fermions.

For example: Atoms are not elementary particles because they are made of protons and neutrons joined together. Protons and neutrons are not elementary particles because they are made up of quarks joined together. Quarks are elementary because there is nothing else that makes up quarks.

This is part of the Standard Model which is the best model physics has to explain the particles.

Fermions have half-integer spins (meaning their spin number is 1/2, 3/2, 5/2, etc.) and are either Quarks or Leptons. There are 12 different types of fermions. The 12 types are called flavors, these are their names:

  • Quarks — up, down, strange, charm, bottom, top
  • Leptons — electron, muon, tau, electron neutrino, muon neutrino, tau neutrino

Bosons have integer spins (their spin numbers are 1,2,3, etc.). Bosons are particles that carry forces. There are gauge bosons, and other bosons which physicists think should exist, but which have not yet been found:

  • Gauge bosons – gluon, W and Z bosons, photon
  • Other bosons — Higgs boson, graviton (neither of these particles have yet been found)