Related papers: Particles, Fields, Pomerons and Beyond
The most successful "Standard Model" allows one to define the so-called "Elementary Particles". Now from another point of view, philosophical, how can we think of them? Which kind of a status can be attributed to Elementary Particles and…
Well over a century after the discovery of the electron, we are still faced with serious conceptual issues regarding precisely what an electron is. Since the development of particle physics and the Standard Model, we have accumulated a…
Quantum foundations are still unsettled, with mixed effects on science and society. By now it should be possible to obtain consensus on at least one issue: Are the fundamental constituents fields or particles? As this paper shows,…
In Bohmian mechanics elementary particles exist objectively, as point particles moving according to a law determined by a wavefunction. In this context, questions as to whether the particles of a certain species are real--questions such as,…
The idea that particles are the basic constituents of all matter dates back to ancient times and formed the basis of physical thought well into modern times. The debate about whether light was a wave or a stream of particles also lasted…
The reader surely knows what particles physics is about: finding building blocks of nature that appear elementary at a given time and study their interactions - so why in the world this essay? The problem is how to arrive at a fundamental…
We describe the very nature of the elementary particles, which our (visible) Universe consists of. We point out that they are not point-like, and we depict their ways of interacting. We also address puzzles that occur even in the absence of…
In this paper we review the experimental and observational searches for stable, massive, elementary particles other than the electron and proton. The particles may be neutral, may have unit charge or may have fractional charge. They may…
Preons are hypothetic constituents of the standard particles. They were initially assumed to have basically similar properties to those of conventional matter. But this is not necessarily the case: the ultimate constituents of matter may…
This article reviews recent theoretical developments in the ab initio study of polarons in materials. The polaron is an emergent quasiparticle that arises from the interaction between electrons and phonons in solids, and consists of an…
Theoretical developments related to the gravitational interaction have questioned the notion of particle in quantum field theory (QFT). For instance, uniquely-defined particle states do not exist in general, in QFT on a curved spacetime.…
Despite its name, Quantum Field Theory (QFT) has been built to describe interactions between localizable particles. For this reason the actual formalism of QFT is partly based on a suitable generalization of the one already used for systems…
Since more than a century we investigate cosmic particles coming from the Universe with the aim of understanding their nature, their origin and how they are accelerated. So far, cosmic rays have provided many impressive results, giving…
Since the particles such as molecules, atoms and nuclei are composite particles, it is important to recognize that physics must be invariant for the composite particles and their constituent particles, this requirement is called particle…
I discuss some compelling suggestions about particles which could be the dark matter in the universe, with special attention to experimental searches for them.
COSMOPARTICLE PHYSICS is the specific crossdisciplinary field of science, studying foundations of particle physics and cosmology in the combination of indirect cosmological, astrophysical and physical signatures of their fundamental…
Particle accelerators and their detectors are the world's most powerful microscopes. They enable us to inspect the constituents of matter at attometer scales, study matter under unusual conditions, and concentrate extraordinary amounts of…
We try to understand how particles acquire mass in general, and in particular, how they acquire mass in the standard model and beyond.
The possibility of fundamental theories with very many ground states, each with different physical parameters, changes the way that we approach the major questions of particle physics. Most importantly, it raises the possibility that these…
The difficulties with which the concept of point-like particles is beset, such as the infinities encountered in the existing theories of elementary particles, suggest a different approach to the study of these particles. Instead of…