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zaybu
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Can anyone explain to me what is the difference between a Weyl spinnor and a Majorana spinnor?
Thanks
Thanks
LAHLH said:aren't Weyl fields two comp spinors? with the Dirac and Majorana fields are four comp being built up from two Weyl fields
zaybu said:Can anyone explain to me what is the difference between a Weyl spinnor and a Majorana spinnor?
Thanks
The main difference between Weyl and Majorana spinors lies in their transformation properties under Lorentz transformations. Weyl spinors are left-handed and right-handed chiral spinors, while Majorana spinors are their own antiparticles and are thus invariant under charge conjugation.
Weyl spinors have half-integer spin quantum numbers, while Majorana spinors have integer spin quantum numbers. This is because Weyl spinors describe massless particles such as neutrinos, while Majorana spinors describe massive particles.
Yes, Weyl and Majorana spinors can be converted into each other through a process called the charge conjugation. This transformation changes the sign of the electric charge, parity, and time reversal of the spinor, but leaves its Lorentz transformation properties unchanged.
Weyl and Majorana spinors have been used in many areas of physics, such as in the Standard Model of particle physics, where Weyl spinors describe the left-handed and right-handed chiral fermions. Majorana spinors have also been proposed as a possible explanation for the origin of dark matter in the universe.
In most experiments, there are no observable differences between Weyl and Majorana spinors. However, there are some subtle differences in certain processes, such as in the scattering of neutrinos, which can be used to distinguish between the two types of spinors.