Sub-Atomic Particles
 Ajat basket, Penan people. Borneo 20th century, 20 (cm) diameter by 35 (cm) height. Hornbill motif. From the Teo Family collection, Kuching. Photograph by D Dunlop.
The positions and trajectories of some simple particles cannot be well known, or even well-defined. To have a properly defined position a particle must contain enough of the right sort of quarks to establish its spatial orientation. But some of the models that we have discussed cannot satisfy this requirement so their positions cannot be assigned without making further assumptions. For example we cannot state the position of a solitary photon. And this uncertain quality can be observed when Young's experiment is performed at low light levels.

One common way of dealing with this issue to to assume that a particle has been absorbed by an atom that does have a well-defined position. Then both particles are supposedly in the same place. Another possibility is to conjecture additional fields or excitations that align a particle's orientation. Such presumptions are codified in various three-dimensional arrangements that assign quarks to sub-orbital events by convention. These designs are called sub-atomic particle models. For example, here are three-dimensional representations of protons and electrons.

 Electron
 $\Large{ k }$ $\large{ \delta _{\hat{m}} }$ $\large{ \delta _{\hat{e}} }$ $\large{ \delta _{\theta} }$ $\large{ \sf{P}_{\it{k}} }$ 1 +1 0 +1 $\,$ 2 0 -1 +1 $\bar{\sf{u}} \ \ \bar{\sf{b}}\sf{t} \ \ \mathrm{2}\bar{\sf{g}}$ 3 -1 0 +1 $\,$ 4 0 +1 +1 $\bar{\sf{u}} \ \ \bar{\sf{s}}\sf{c} \ \ \mathrm{2}\sf{e}$ 5 +1 0 -1 $\,$ 6 0 -1 -1 $\bar{\sf{u}} \ \ \bar{\sf{b}}\sf{t} \ \ \mathrm{2}\bar{\sf{g}}$ 7 -1 0 -1 $\,$ 8 0 +1 -1 $\bar{\sf{u}} \ \ \bar{\sf{s}}\sf{c} \ \ \mathrm{2}\sf{e}$
 Proton
 $\Large{ k }$ $\large{ \delta _{\hat{m}} }$ $\large{ \delta _{\hat{e}} }$ $\large{ \delta _{\theta} }$ $\large{ \sf{P}_{\it{k}} }$ 1 +1 0 +1 $\sf{d} \ \ \bar{\sf{t}} \sf{b}$ 2 0 -1 +1 $\,$ 3 -1 0 +1 $\bar{\sf{d}} \ \ \bar{\sf{t}} \sf{b}$ 4 0 +1 +1 $\,$ 5 +1 0 -1 $\sf{d} \ \ \bar{\sf{t}} \sf{b}$ 6 0 -1 -1 $\,$ 7 -1 0 -1 $\bar{\sf{d}} \ \ \bar{\sf{t}} \sf{b}$ 8 0 +1 -1 $\,$

page revision: 201, last edited: 08 Jan 2018 20:06