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THE STANDARD MODEL
M. HERRERO
Departamento de Fisica Teorica Facultad de Ciencias, C-XI Universidad Autonoma de Madrid Cantoblanco, 28049 Madrid, Spain e-mail:herrero@delta.ft.uam.es
ABSTRACTThese lectures provide an introduction to the basic aspects of the Stan-dard Model,
SU 
(3)
C 
×
SU 
(2)
L
×
U 
(1)
Y 
.
1
1. Introduction
All known particle physics phenomena are extremely well described withinthe Santard Model (SM) of elementary particles and their fundamentalinteractions. The SM provides a very elegant theoretical framework and ithas succesfully passed very precise tests which at present are at the 0
.
1%level [1, 2, 3, 4].We understand by elementary particles the point-like constituents of matter with no known substructure up to the present limits of 10
−
18
−
10
−
19
m
. These are of two types, the basic building blocks of matter them-selves konwn as matter particles and the intermediate interaction particles.The first ones are fermions of spin
s
=
12
and are classified into leptonsand quarks. The known leptons are: the electron,
e
−
, the muon,
µ
−
andthe
τ 
−
with electric charge
Q
=
−
1 (all charges are given in units of theelementary charge
e
); and the corresponding neutrinos
ν 
e
,
ν 
µ
and
ν 
τ 
with
Q
= 0. The known quarks are of six different flavors:
u
,
d
,
s
,
c
,
b
and
t
andhave fractional charge
Q
=
23
,
−
13
,
−
13
,
23
,
−
13
and
23
respectively.
1
Lectures presented at the NATO ASI 98 School, Techniques and Concepts of HighEnergy Physics; St. Croix, Virgin Islands, USA, June 18-29 1998
FTUAM 98/25
Dec.-1998hep-ph/9812242
 
2The quarks have an additional quantum number, the color, which forthem can be of three types, generically denoted as
q
i
,
i
= 1
,
2
,
3. We knowthat color is not seen in Nature and therefore the elementary quarks mustbe confined into the experimentally observed matter particles, the hadrons.These colorless composite particles are classified into baryons and mesons.The baryons are fermions made of three quarks,
qqq
, as for instance theproton,
p
∼
uud
, and the neutron,
n
∼
ddu
. The mesons are bosons madeof one quark and one antiquark as for instance the pions,
π
+
∼
u
¯
d
and
π
−
∼
d
¯
u
.The second kind of elementary particles are the intermediate interactionparticles. By leaving apart the gravitational interactions, all the relevantinteractions in Particle Physics are known to be mediated by the exchangeof an elementary particle that is a boson with spin
s
= 1. The photon,
γ 
, is the exchanged particle in the electromagnetic interactions, the eightgluons
g
α
;
α
= 1
,..
8 mediate the strong interactions among quarks, andthe three weak bosons,
W 
±
,
Z 
are the corresponding intermediate bosonsof the weak interactions.As for the theoretical aspects, the SM is a quantum field theory thatis based on the gauge symmetry
SU 
(3)
C 
×
SU 
(2)
L
×
U 
(1)
Y 
. This gaugegroup includes the symmetry group of the strong interactions,
SU 
(3)
C 
, andthe symmetry group of the electroweak interactions,
SU 
(2)
L
×
U 
(1)
Y 
. Thegroup symmetry of the electromagnetic interactions,
U 
(1)
em
, appears inthe SM as a subgroup of 
SU 
(2)
L
×
U 
(1)
Y 
and it is in this sense that theweak and electromagnetic interactions are said to be unified.
The gauge sector
of the SM is composed of eight gluons which arethe gauge bosons of 
SU 
(3)
C 
and the
γ 
,
W 
±
and
Z 
particles which arethe four gauge bosons of 
SU 
(2)
L
×
U 
(1)
Y 
. The main physical propertiesof these intermediate gauge bosons are as follows. The gluons are massless,electrically neutral and carry color quantum number. Thereare eight gluonssince they come in eight different colors. The consequence of the gluonsbeing colorful is that they interact not just with the quarks but also withthemselves. The weak bosons,
W 
±
and
Z 
are massive particles and alsoselfinteracting. The
W 
±
are charged with
Q
=
±
1 respectively and the
Z 
is electricaly neutral. The photon
γ 
is massless, chargeless and non-selfinteracting.Concerning the range of the various interactions, it is well known theinfinite range of the electromagnetic interactions as it corresponds to aninteraction mediated by a massless gauge boson, the short range of the weakinteractions of about 10
−
16
cm
correspondingly to the exchange of a massivegauge particle with a mass of the order of 
M 
V 
∼
100
GeV 
and, finally, thestrong interactions whose range is not infinite, as it should correspond to theexchange of a massless gluon, but finite due to the extra physical property
 
3of confinement. In fact, the short range of the strong interactions of about10
−
13
cm
corresponds to the typical size of the ligthest hadrons.As for the strength of the three interactions, the electromagnetic interac-tions are governed by the size of the electromagnetic coupling constant
e
orequivalently
α
=
e
2
4
π
which at low energies is given by the fine structure con-stant,
α
(
Q
=
m
e
) =
1137
. The weak interactions at energies much lower thanthe exchanged gauge boson mass,
M 
V 
, have an effective (weak) strengthgiven by the dimensionful Fermi constant
G
F 
= 1
.
167
×
10
−
5
GeV 
−
2
. Thename of strong interactions is due to their comparative stronger strengththan the other interactions. This strength is governed by the size of thestrong copling constant
g
S 
or equivalently
α
S 
=
g
2
s
4
π
and is varies from largevalues to low energies,
α
S 
(
Q
=
m
hadron
)
∼
1 up to the vanishing asymp-totic limit
α
S 
(
Q
→ ∞
)
→
0. This last limit indicates that the quarksbehave as free particles when they are observed at infinitely large energiesor, equivalently, inflinitely short distances and it is known as the propertyof asymptotic freedom.Finally, regarding the present status of the matter particle content of the SM the situation is summarized as follows.
The fermionic sector
of quarks and leptons are organized in threefamilies with identical properties except for mass. The particle content ineach family is:1
st
family:
ν 
e
e
−
L
,
e
−
R
,
ud
L
,
u
R
,
d
R
2
nd
family:
ν 
µ
µ
−
L
,
µ
−
R
,
cs
L
,
c
R
,
s
R
3
rd
family:
ν 
τ 
τ 
−
L
,
τ 
−
R
,
tb
L
,
t
R
,
b
R
and their corresponding antiparticles. The left-handed and right-handedfields are defined by means of the chirality operator
γ 
5
as usual,
e
−
L
=
12
(1
−
γ 
5
)
e
−
;
e
−
R
=
12
(1 +
γ 
5
)
e
−
and they transform as doublets and singlets of 
SU 
(2)
L
respectively.
The scalar sector
of the SM is not experimentaly confirmed yet. Thefact that the weak gauge bosons are massive particles,
M 
±
W 
,
M 
Z 
= 0,
of 00

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