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Concept
Quantum chromodynamics
Summary
In theoretical physics, quantum chromodynamics (QCD) is the theory of the strong interaction between quarks mediated by gluons. Quarks are fundamental particles that make up composite hadrons such as the proton, neutron and pion. QCD is a type of quantum field theory called a non-abelian gauge theory, with symmetry group SU(3). The QCD analog of electric charge is a property called color. Gluons are the force carriers of the theory, just as photons are for the electromagnetic force in quantum electrodynamics. The theory is an important part of the Standard Model of particle physics. A large body of experimental evidence for QCD has been gathered over the years.
QCD exhibits three salient properties:
Color confinement. Due to the force between two color charges remaining constant as they are separated, the energy grows until a quark–antiquark pair is spontaneously produced, turning the initial hadron into a pair of hadrons instead of isolating a color charge. Although analytically unproven, color confinement is well established from lattice QCD calculations and decades of experiments.
Asymptotic freedom, a steady reduction in the strength of interactions between quarks and gluons as the energy scale of those interactions increases (and the corresponding length scale decreases). The asymptotic freedom of QCD was discovered in 1973 by David Gross and Frank Wilczek, and independently by David Politzer in the same year. For this work, all three shared the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Chiral symmetry breaking, the spontaneous symmetry breaking of an important global symmetry of quarks, detailed below, with the result of generating masses for hadrons far above the masses of the quarks, and making pseudoscalar mesons exceptionally light. Yoichiro Nambu was awarded the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physics for elucidating the phenomenon, a dozen years before the advent of QCD. Lattice simulations have confirmed all his generic predictions.
Physicist Murray Gell-Mann coined the word quark in its present sense.
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Ontological neighbourhood
Related concepts (30)
Quantum field theory
In theoretical physics, quantum field theory (QFT) is a theoretical framework that combines classical field theory, special relativity, and quantum mechanics. QFT is used in particle physics to construct physical models of subatomic particles and in condensed matter physics to construct models of quasiparticles. QFT treats particles as excited states (also called quanta) of their underlying quantum fields, which are more fundamental than the particles.
Standard Model
The Standard Model of particle physics is the theory describing three of the four known fundamental forces (electromagnetic, weak and strong interactions – excluding gravity) in the universe and classifying all known elementary particles. It was developed in stages throughout the latter half of the 20th century, through the work of many scientists worldwide, with the current formulation being finalized in the mid-1970s upon experimental confirmation of the existence of quarks.
Gluon
A gluon (ˈɡluːɒn ) is an elementary particle that acts as the exchange particle (or gauge boson) for the strong force between quarks. It is analogous to the exchange of photons in the electromagnetic force between two charged particles. Gluons bind quarks together, forming hadrons such as protons and neutrons. Gluons are vector gauge bosons that mediate strong interactions of quarks in quantum chromodynamics (QCD). Gluons themselves carry the color charge of the strong interaction.