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Concept
Electron–positron annihilation
Summary
Electron–positron annihilation occurs when an electron (_Electron) and a positron (_Positron, the electron's antiparticle) collide. At low energies, the result of the collision is the annihilation of the electron and positron, and the creation of energetic photons:
_Electron + _Positron → _Photon + _Photon
At high energies, other particles, such as B mesons or the W and Z bosons, can be created. All processes must satisfy a number of conservation laws, including:
Conservation of electric charge. The net charge before and after is zero.
Conservation of linear momentum and total energy. This forbids the creation of a single photon. However, in quantum field theory this process is allowed; see examples of annihilation.
Conservation of angular momentum.
Conservation of total (i.e. net) lepton number, which is the number of leptons (such as the electron) minus the number of antileptons (such as the positron); this can be described as a conservation of (net) matter law.
As with any two charged objects, electrons and positrons may also interact with each other without annihilating, in general by elastic scattering.
There are only a very limited set of possibilities for the final state. The most probable is the creation of two or more gamma photons. Conservation of energy and linear momentum forbid the creation of only one photon. (An exception to this rule can occur for tightly bound atomic electrons.) In the most common case, two gamma photons are created, each with energy equal to the rest energy of the electron or positron (.511MeV). A convenient frame of reference is that in which the system has no net linear momentum before the annihilation; thus, after collision, the gamma photons are emitted in opposite directions. It is also common for three to be created, since in some angular momentum states, this is necessary to conserve charge parity. It is also possible to create any larger number of photons, but the probability becomes lower with each additional gamma photon because these more complex processes have lower probability amplitudes.
Official source
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