PhysicsCode 9702
Fundamental particles
What this topic asks you to be able to do
- understand that quarks are fundamental particles, and that six kinds of quark, known as flavours (types), are present: up, down, strange, charm, top and bottom
- recall and use the charge carried by each quark flavour, and understand that the matching antiquark has the opposite charge (no other properties of quarks need to be known)
- recall that the proton and the neutron are not fundamental particles, and describe the quark composition of each
- understand that hadrons are of two kinds: baryons, made up of three quarks, and mesons, made up of a quark and an antiquark
- describe what happens to the quark composition during β– and β+ decay
- recall that the name lepton is given to electrons and neutrinos, which are fundamental particles