The Large Hadron Collider just discovered three new sub-atomic particles

boing
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All subatomic particles are (thought to) be of two kinds:

  1. Elementary particles, which are supposedly indivisible.
    a. Leptons, including electrons, neutrinos, and several other relatives, most of which are seen as products of various nuclear reactions.
    b. Quarks, which come in six “flavors” and are never found alone.
    c. Bosons, of which five elementary types are now known, including our friend the photon. Four of them convey forces (electromagnetism, strong and weak nuclear forces). The other (Higgs) somehow creates mass via the “Higgs field”. A graviton has been proposed as a carrier of gravity force.
  2. “Composite” particles that are made of various combinations of elementary particles. Most All “normal” matter is made of leptons and quarks. So a hydrogen atom is made of one lepton (the electron) and three quarks (that make up the proton).

See? Easy! :slight_smile:

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