Recent content by AlanKirby

Wouldn't I need QFT to understand the origin of the majority of the mass within hadrons? I understanding that asking "why" repeatedly within physics eventually leads to the answer of "because that's how/what the universe is", and I understand that we learn of energy and mass early on. But I...

I thought I'd get pulled for saying that. I was just referring to the relation between energy and mass, or rather that they are in a sense the same. I see from the above posts that I'm not quite thinking about that peoperly though. What I'm really trying to understand is what is energy (maybe...

Thank you for the insight, this is helping me to progress. I think I need to properly take on QFT and group theory before I can expect to really make sense of those things that I'm thinking about. Can I just ask though, what would you consider both energy and mass (seperately) to be? Thanks.

I didn't mean that the conservation of energy takes an alternate form, but rather that energy and momentum are both conserved quantities, energy can take an alternate form (mass), so can momentum then also take an alternate form? I.e. Is energy a special conserved quantity in this sense, such...

Let me set up the question briefly. Emmy Noether's theorem relates symmetry to conserved quantities, e.g. invariance under translations in time => conservation of energy. A fundamental truth revealed. Massive gauge bosons, leptons and quarks all appear to acquire mass through the spontaneous...

Thanks for the reply. Your first sentence causes an odd confusion for me. You're saying that it's a consequence of Fourier transforming the Fermi-Dirac distribution. Fourier transforming as far as I'm aware is simply a tool for taking a description in terms of position and obtaining an...

Thanks for the response. I'm currently doing a masters project and an STM image appears to be showing these Friedel oscillations, which have been reported in the literature as appearing on other surfaces of the same complex metallic alloy. Hence I'm reading into them to try and write some...

Hi, and thank you to anyone who replies. I was hoping that someone could please elucidate as to what Friedel oscillations are and what causes them. All of the material that I can find on it is either too simple ("it's an oscillation in the charge density..." or "quantum mechanical analog of...

Hi there, my question is the following. If an electron and positron annihilate, how can they result in ZZ? The issue I'm having is that due to charge conservation, the exchange particle can't be W- or W+. It also can't be a photon since the Z's don't have electrical charge to couple to. It...

That really helps, thank you.

Hi there, my question is along the lines of the following. I understand that in an experiment we obtain a distribution of masses for a given particle, due to the finite resolution of the detectors. In terms of a fundamental (if that even makes sense) decay width, what is the decay width? Is it...

Thanks for your response. So are you suggesting that 'idea 2' is the correct way to be thinking about it on a simple level?

Thank you for your response. Can I please ask for a recommended text for this material, preferably an introductory text and then separately a more advanced text. Thanks again.

Hi there, so my question is as follows. I understand that only the weak interaction can change the flavour of a quark, but why? Idea 1: It's due to the change in flavour also meaning a change in mass, thus a massive exchange particle is needed (gravity is negligible so forget the massive...

Hi, so my question is along the lines of the following: If I'm looking at the decay channel H=>ZZ=>4 Muons, why would the resultant distribution for the mass of the parent Higgs be a Gaussian? Is it a case of the peak is the actual value of the Higgs at rest; those of greater mass are Higgs...