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THE COLORS OR FLAVORS OF THE PROTON AND NEUTRON

We have all heard of the proton and the neutron as they are both standard atomic particles that make up the nucleus of an atom. In other words, the proton and neutron are the basic building blocks of everything we know in the universe, everything! This makes the proton and neutron pretty important to us and the universe. On the particle physics side of things the proton and neutron are Baryons which is a subcategory of Fermions. Probably the simplest way to think of Fermions, and therefore Baryons, is that they are the basic building blocks of matter.

So, the question I am asking now is how many different kinds, flavors or colors of protons are there?

The standard answer that has been taught for years is one. However, if we dig a little deeper we will see that there is more than one kind, flavor or color of proton and neutron. Specifically, there are three distinct flavors or colors of protons and neutrons, potentially six flavors or colors if we expand the definition of a proton and neutron slightly.

There is no trickery, slight of hand or magic associated with showing that there are more than a single kind of proton or neutron. It is nothing more than applying current theories associated with the Standard Model of Particles.

The current accepted scientific information from the standard model of particles is that the proton and neutron are made up of three first generation quarks. There are two distinct first generation quarks. They are the “up” quark and the “down” quark. Since three quarks are required to make a proton or neutron but there are only two different kinds of quarks one of them must be doubled.

For the sake of simplicity, lets split this up and look at the only the proton for now. In the case of the proton it is the ‘up’ quark that is doubled. This means the proton is made of two ‘up’ quarks and one ‘down’ quark.

It turns out that there are a whole bunch of rules that need to be followed for combining quarks into particles. Thank you quantum physics, specifically Quantum Chromodynamics or QCD for short. For now the focus is going to be on just one of the rules which is commonly referred to as the exclusionary principle. This rule basically says that there cannot be two of the same quarks combined to make a particle. But, the proton has two ‘up’ quarks so how is this combination allowed in the making of a proton. Well the current standard model theory is that all quarks come in three colors; red, blue and green. These are not “real” colors, rather they are an assigned binding force identifier that is associated with holding the quarks together in the proton. And, since there are three colors of quarks it is now easy to avoid exclusionary rule conflicts.

So, when we use the information that we just covered we come up with the following protons; (Note: for clarity and individual identity purposes, each proton has been named by the color of the single ‘down’ quark.)

Blue Proton => DOWN blue, UP red, UP green

Red Proton => DOWN red, UP green, UP blue

Green Proton => DOWN green, UP blue, UP red

Each of these three protons are what is known as color neutral (another rule which is another topic and not necessary for this paper) and the ‘up’ quarks are different colors from the down quark, so they comply with the rules. And, clearly we have three different individual and unique protons.

As for the neutron, everything that was just covered for the proton applies to the neutron. The difference is the neutron is made up of two ‘down’ quarks and one ‘up’ quark, which gives us the following; (again, for clarity and individual identity purposes, each neutron has been named by the color of the single ‘down’ quark.)

Blue Neutron => UP blue, DOWN red, DOWN green

Red Neutron => UP red, DOWN green, DOWN blue

Green Neutron => UP green, DOWN blue, DOWN red

Again, there are clearly three distinct individually unique neutrons.

All of this now begs the question why is there three colors/flavors or protons and neutrons? Given our current incomplete understanding of particle physics, and taking the easiest way to make things work, the simplest view would be to ignore the individual uniqueness of the three protons and neutrons and say that all three of the different protons and neutrons behave exactly the same. In other words, their independent color/flavor does not mean anything. This is in essence what the current QCD theory implies. It just goes about establishing this sameness in a very unusual, very confusing and very complex way.

As I covered earlier, quark color is associated with the binding force of the quarks, also known as the “strong nuclear force” and the particle that transmits this binding or color/strong force is called the “gluon.” And there are eight independent gluons. The purpose of the gluon interaction is to hold the three quarks together, no matter what. The color/strong force, gluons and how they work with quarks now and in the alternate theory will be covered in another paper.

The simplest part of the current QCD theory is that the three quarks constantly exchange gluons among each other in order to hold themselves together in a small tight group. This gluon exchange results in a very unique interaction with the quarks. The best way to see this is to start with an example.

NOTE: The following is very confusing, a simplified visual is at the end of the described interaction

So, lets say you have a proton configured like this;

DOWN blue, UP red, UP green.

Say one of the gluons from the DOWN blue interacts with the UP red. This causes the following to occur;

DOWN blue quark turns into a DOWN red quark and the UP red quark turns into a UP blue quark.

Remember,there is a constant color force interaction between the quarks.

So, at the same time as the above interaction occurs we have the following;

UP green quark interacts with the DOWN blue quark causing the following to occur;

The UP green quark turns to a UP blue quark and the DOWN blue quark turns to DOWN green quark.

WHAT A MESS! I gave the warning that the QCD theory was very unusual, very confusing and very complex.

The above interactions should have spit out the following;

DOWN green, UP blue, UP blue. Since this outcome is an exclusionary principle violation, I am going to try to simplify the interaction visual;

Db interacts with Ur gives Dr and Ub

Ug interacts with Db gives Ub and Dg

Final is Dg and Ub and Ub

So yes, for some moment of time there is a violation of the exclusionary principle. Not to mention a potential simultaneous interaction at the original DOWN blue quark.

In spite of the conflict shown above the general current QCD theory is that gluon interactions between the quarks occurs in a fashion and/or manner where there are no problems. So under the current QCD theory there are no problems or conflicts and the three quarks in the proton, and the neutron, simply rotate through the three acceptable colors/flavors or protons and neutrons listed.

One last thing about QCD that needs to be said, the mathematics is so difficult that it currently cannot be solved. In other words, even though the math of QCD cannot be solved the conclusion is there are no problems with the current theory of quark and the color/strong force interaction.

I look at it this way, a red rose is not a yellow rose and not all roses are the same as there is the rose bush, the climbing rose and many other kinds of rose plants. I also believe that a logic argument could be made that since there is a required color neutrality and exclusionary principle the three flavors of protons and neutrons cannot be the same. There must be some natural reason to have three flavors/colors of neutrons and three flavors/colors of protons.

Consider the following; the lowest energy stable state of the three quarks in the proton and neutron is with all three of the quarks in contact with each other. This lowest energy state should not need an ongoing gluon exchange. Even if it did, there should be a “neutral” low energy gluon that can facilitate the lowest energy, stable state.

I stated at the beginning of this piece that there could be six color/flavors of the proton and neutron. So, let’s convolute this whole matter even more and look at this claim. As stated above, based on the current standard model theories, a proton is made up of two up quarks and one down quark while a neutron is two down quarks and one up quark. As was also previously stated the proton and neutron are baryons. Turns out that there are a bunch of other baryons. The expectation is that in going through the list of other baryons we should not see any other baryons with the proton and neutron quark configurations. Well, it turns out that this is not the case as there is another baryon particle with the same proton and neutron quark configuration.

It turns out that there are what I call a super proton and a super neutron. They are super in the sense that they have a rest mass about 30 greater than the normal proton and neutron. The super proton is the Delta+ Baryon and just like the proton is made up of two up quarks and one down quark. Similarly, the super neutron is the Delta-0 Baryon which is made up of two down quarks and one up quark just like the neutron. Since Delta+ and Delta-0 have the same quark makeup as the proton and neutron, they too must come in three colors/flavors. These three additional super proton and super neutron colors/flavors would give the six total proton and neutron colors.

The first question that comes to mind is “are there any other Baryons that have the same quark makeup but a significantly different rest mass?” And the answer is “No.”

The next question, why do all of the other Baryons have a unique quark make up while the proton and neutron, which make up everything in our universe do not? Answer, “Uknown.”

The last question, for now, how is a possible for the Delta+ and Delta-0 to have a greater rest mass than the proton and neutron when they have the exact same quark makeup? Again, the answer is “Unknown.”

Since we are on a roll with unusual conditions associated with the most common baryons in our universe, the proton and the neutron, let’s take a look at some additional unusual information:

A free proton has an estimated half-life of about 1032 years, which is a one followed by 33 zeros.

For perspective the universe is about 13.8 billion years old, or 13.8 X 109 years old.

A free neutron has an estimated half-life of a little over 10 mins.

When a free neutron decays, it decays into a free proton. That is a free neutron with a 10 minute lifespan changes into a proton that almost lives forever.

The Delta+ (the super proton) and the Delta-0 (the super neutron) have lifetimes of 0.6 X 10–23 seconds. This is 23 zeros between the ‘6’ and the decimal point.

When all things are considered, there is no consistency or predictability associated with the neutron and proton quark makeup.

Lets go back for a moment to the current QCD theory of quarks, protons and neutrons. Recall that the changing or flipping of quark colors via the gluons is a constant process. It is always happening in every proton and neutron in our universe for as along as the proton and neutron exist. The question that has to be asked is where does all of the energy needed to maintain the lifetime of quark flipping come from, and how and where is it stored? Is there a never ending source of energy inside every proton and neutron? Additionally, under QCD all other quark combinations also have to experience the QCD gluon exchange and quark color flipping. Were does the energy for this come from and where is it stored?

All of the QCD information just covered is real and factual as determined by current particle physics theories. Is there any information to explain any of the just covered information or answer the previous questions? No, there is not. The only possible conclusion that we can take away from the proton and neutron color/flavor information that I have covered is that there is still a lot more that needs to be learned. Some how enough gluons have to be produced inside of the proton and neutron to facilitate the exchange of force process. This infers that there has to be some type of energy source inside of the protons and neutrons that can produce the necessary gluons for the proton and neutron lifetime. This in turn indicates that there must be some type of limit to the gluon energy reserve.

In order to make the information more accessible, and hopefully understandable, I have simplified the information covered. This simplification does not effect any of the information covered in this paper.

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