Fermion

Key Stage 5

Meaning

Fermions are a group of subatomic particles which are not able to exist in the same place at the same time as one another.

About Fermions

Subatomic particles are divided into two major categories; fermions and bosons. Boson, in contrast to fermions, can exist in the same place at the same time as one another.

The fermions include:

• Leptons - A group of fundamental particles
  • Electron - A type of lepton with a mass of 9.11x10^-31 and a charge of -1.60x10^-19.
  • Muon - A type of lepton often referred to as a 'heavy electron' same charge as an electron (-1.60x10^-19) but a mass 206 times the mass of an electron.
  • Neutrino - A type of lepton with zero charge and negligible mass.
• Quarks - A group of subatomic particles believed to be fundamental but have never been observed on their own. They always exists in either a triplet of quarks or a quark-antiquark pair.
• Hadrons - Subatomic particles made of quarks.
  • Baryons - A type of hadron made of 3 quarks.
    • Proton - A type of baryon with a mass of 1.67x10^-27 and a charge of 1.60x10^-19, made of 2 Up-quarks and 1 Down-quark.
    • Neutron - A type of baryon with a mass of 1.67x10^-27 and zero charge, made of 2 Down-quarks and 1 Up-quark.