Читать книгу String Theory For Dummies - Andrew Zimmerman Jones - Страница 42

In addition to gravity and electromagnetism, 20th-century physicists identified two nuclear forces called the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force. These forces are also mediated by particles. The strong force is mediated by a type of particle called a gluon — there are eight gluons, distinguished by their color charge. This has nothing to do with actual colors, it’s just a name that physicists invented. This is why the theory of strong interactions is called quantum chromodynamics (chroma is Greek for color).

The weak force is mediated by three particles: Z, W⁺, and W^– bosons. These are actually closely related to the photon, the particle that mediate electromagnetic interactions. (You can read more about these particles in Chapter 8.)

The strong nuclear force holds quarks together to form protons and neutrons, but it also holds the protons and neutrons together inside the atom’s nucleus.

The weak nuclear force, on the other hand, is responsible for radioactive decay, such as when a neutron decays into a proton. The processes governed by the weak nuclear force are responsible for the burning of stars and the formation of heavy elements inside stars.