An Introduction To The Standard Model of Particle Physics For The Non-Specialist

An Introduction to the
Standard Model
of Particle Physics
for the Non-Specialist
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An Introduction to the
Standard Model
of Particle Physics
for the Non-Specialist
Gerald E. Marsh
formerly of Argonne National Laboratory, Chicago
World Scientific
NEW JERSEY • LONDON • SINGAPORE • BEIJING • SHANGHAI • HONG KONG • TAIPEI • CHENNAI • TOKYO
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Published by
World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
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USA office: 27 Warren Street, Suite 401-402, Hackensack, NJ 07601
UK office: 57 Shelton Street, Covent Garden, London WC2H 9HE
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STANDARD MODEL OF PARTICLE PHYSICS

FOR THE NON-SPECIALIST
Copyright © 2018 by World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form or by any means,
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ISBN 978-981-3232-58-7
Printed in Singapore
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This book is dedicated to the memory of Isidore Hauser who took me
under his wing in graduate school and taught me so much in the
following years. It all started when I was going to leave school and he
asked me, “Are you by any chance interested in general relativity?”
I could not have had a better mentor.
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Preface
It is the purpose of this book to take the reader from some elementary
ideas about groups to the essence of the Standard Model of particle
physics along a relatively straight and intuitive path. Groups, from a
pedagogical point of view, are usually introduced relatively late in a
physics education. I will begin with them here to arrive at a semblance of
the Dirac equation. This is followed by introducing the very essence of
elementary quantum theory to obtain the actual Dirac equation, which
governs the motion of the quarks and leptons of the Standard Model. An
introduction to the gauge principle is then given and this will take us via
the groups introduced in the beginning to an introduction to the Standard
Model. In following this path, many technical details, and much of the
physics, will be ignored. The idea is to give an Olympian view of this
evolution, one that is often missing when absorbing the detailed subject
matter of the Standard Model as presented in an historical approach to
the subject.
The idea that particles are the basic constituents of all matter dates back
to ancient times and formed the basis of physical thought well into
modern times. The debate about whether light was a wave or a stream of
particles also lasted until relatively recently. It was the advent of de
Broglie’s work and its implications that revolutionized the concept of an
elementary particle — but unfortunately did not banish the idea of a
vii
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viii Standard Model of Particle Physics for the Non-Specialist
point particle despite its difficulties in both classical and quantum

physics. Some of these problems are discussed in Appendix A titled The
Particle Enigma, which covers chiral oscillations, Penrose’s “zigzag”
picture of particles satisfying the Dirac equation, and some ideas derived
from string theory. Appendix B is an introduction to the spinor
representations of the Lorentz group and Appendix C discusses the
Schwinger term. Appendix D introduces the cosmic microwave
background radiation as a resource for the part of the book covering the
use of the standard model in the early universe.
Gerald E. Marsh
Contents
Preface vii
Groups 1
A Semblance of the Dirac Equation From Groups 9

Minimalist Quantum Mechanics 15
Gauge Principle 19
Arbitrary Gauge Group Local Symmetry Transformations

and Corresponding Gauge Covariant Derivatives 22
Standard Model Beginnings 25
Isospin 26
The Electro-Weak Group SU 2 L U 1 Y 28
Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking 36
The Weinberg-Salam Model and Gauge Field Masses 44
Particles of the Standard Model and QCD 51
Representation Products 63
Color Confinement 67
Problems with the Standard Model 73
A Few Metaphysical Thoughts 74
Appendix A: The Particle Enigma 83
A1. The de Broglie Relation: Theory and Experiment 85
A2. The Zig-Zag Picture of the Electron 88
Chirality and Chiral Oscillation 93
Chiral Oscillations and Frequency 95
A3. Beyond Democritus 101
A Topological Alternative for Charge 104
Summary 117
ix
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x Standard Model of Particle Physics for the Non-Specialist
Addendum 1: Electron Channeling Resonance in Crystals 118

Addendum 2: Zitterbewegung 121
Photon Zitterbewegung 124
Appendix B: Spinor Representations of the Lorentz Group 137
Appendix C: The Schwinger Term 141
Appendix D: The Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation 145

A Few Reference Books 151
Index 153
Chapter 1
Groups
In discussing the general mathematical idea of symmetry, Herman Weyl

made the statement: “As far as I see, all a priori statements in physics
have their origin in symmetry.” But even our earliest perceptions of
space and time and the invariance associated with them lead to the
concept of groups.
The limited material introduced here from the vast field of group theory
attempts to avoid the extensive background needed for a precise
presentation. It also draws on how the material is often presented in the
physics literature, which is often imprecise if not down right sloppy from
a mathematical perspective. Even so, since most of the potential readers
of this book are expected to be from the physics community, it is
important to make the connection to the physics literature. As much as
possible, the notation is consistent with that used in physics.
When speaking of symmetry in quantum field theory one often defines

different types of symmetry, the broadest division being into manifest
symmetry, meaning the apparent type of symmetry found in the
translation or rotation groups, and hidden symmetry where the symmetry
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2 Standard Model of Particle Physics for the Non-Specialist
only appears for special values of a parameter. This is the type that will
be discussed below when symmetry breaking is introduced. There is a
further distinction into local and global symmetries where local means
that the parameters of the group depend on space-time location whereas
global symmetries do not. Local symmetry, and its relation to dynamics
is the foundation of all gauge theories.
Groups are abstract entities that are defined very broadly. They are
required to satisfy the requirements that they have a closed binary
operation that is associative, an identity element (also sometimes called a
unit element), and each element must have an inverse. The closure
property guarantees that the binary composition operation does not result
in elements outside of the group. Group representations allow groups to
act on vector spaces over fields such as the real or imaginary numbers.
Groups can, and often do, have representations as matrices, and this is
the representation that will be used here. For the cognoscenti, a matrix
representation of a group G is a homomorphism (a mapping that
preserves the group structure) from G onto GL(n, R) or GL(n, C).
Our focus will be on continuous groups (Lie groups) and we will begin
with the simplest example of such a group, the set of all complex phase
factors . These phase factors form a unitary group called
U(1), which when treated as a manifold (a Lie group) is 1-dimensional.
Here unitary simply refers to all complex numbers with modulus unity.
Groups 3
Let us move on to two dimensions. If x1 and x2 are the coordinates of a

point in a plane, we can transform these coordinates by use of a linear
transformation represented by a real matrix; that is, if x is a one by two
column matrix with entries x1 and x2, x´ = Ax, or

x1 a a x1
= 11 12 .

x2 a 21 a 22 x2
If the det(A) = a11a22a12a21 ≠ 0, and we require that length be preserved

′2 ′2 2 2
so that 1 2 1 2, there will be constraints on the elements of
the matrix A. Simply substituting the transformation above into the latter
expression for the requirement that the length be preserved results in the
conditions:
2 2 2 2
a 11 + a 21 = 1, a 11a 12 + a 21a 22 = 0, a 12 + a 22 = 1,
2
which in turn imply that 11 22 12 21 1, or det 1. The
transformation is a rotation and the plus sign corresponds to a proper
rotation and the minus to one that changes the orientation. We will
restrict further consideration to only proper rotations where det(A) = +1.
There are three conditions here imposed on four parameters leaving only
one free parameter. This, of course, corresponds to the angle of rotation
in the plane. It is readily confirmed that these transformations form a
group, which is known as the special orthogonal group in two
dimensions, SO(2), and the term “special” corresponds to the choice of
det(A) = +1. The requirement that the length be invariant can easily be
extended to higher Euclidean dimensions to yield the groups SO(N).
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A Hilbert space is a linear space over the field of complex numbers,

meaning that if  and  are vectors in a Hilbert space then  +  is in the
Hilbert space as is c, where c is any complex number. More precisely, a
Hilbert space is an inner product space, which — as a metric space — is
complete. In quantum mechanics the state of a system is a unit vector in
Hilbert space. Any symmetry will then be connected to a unitary or anti-
unitary transformation on this space (the unitary property will be
discussed shortly).
Suppose we now allow the entries aij in the transformation matrix above
to be complex numbers, and in addition require the transformation to
2 | 2 |2 as an invariant. As above, we now obtain the
have | 1 |
conditions
2 2 2 2 * *
a 11 + a 21 = 1, a 12 + a 22 = 1, a 11a 12 + a 21a 22 = 0.
These conditions are equivalent to requiring A†A = 1, and the determinant
†
of the matrix has modulus unity. Here designates the transpose of the
matrix and the complex conjugate of the elements. This is known as the
Hermitian conjugate while * is the complex conjugate. Matrices
satisfying these requirements belong to the representation of the unitary
group U(2). If we now add the additional requirement that the
determinant of the matrix is unity, this will result in | | | | 1,
and the transformation matrix will have the special form
a 11 a 12
* * .
a 12 a 11
Groups 5
From the original eight free parameters there are now only three. These
matrices are known as the special unitary matrices for two dimensions or
SU(2). Special unitary transformations are especially important in
quantum mechanics and for what follows. Higher dimensional special
unitary groups may also be defined and are known as SU(N), and SU(3)
will play an important role later.
Two other concepts from group theory will be relevant in what follows,
that of a normal subgroup and a factor group. If one has a group G and
an element g where g  G, and a subgroup N  G, if N is a normal
subgroup then Ng, the set of all elements of N multiplied by g  G on the
right, is the same as the set of all elements of N multiplied by g on the
left; that is gN = Ng or gN – Ng = 0. Another way of writing this is

gNg 1 = N, which means that N is left invariant by every inner
automorphism of G. When this is the case, N is said to be self-conjugate.

If a group contains normal subgroups then it may be expressed as being
made up of smaller groups. The expression gN is known as a coset and
when N is normal the cosets themselves form a group known as a factor
(or quotient) group written G/N. One says that the group of cosets of N
under the induced operation (taken from G) is the factor group of G
modulo N. Although it is often said that the cosets are residue classes of
G modulo N, it might be better to say that the left cosets are residue
classes of the group homomorphism f:GG/N defined by ggN, and
similarly for the right cosets. Groups having no non-trivial normal
subgroups are known as simple groups; that is, a simple group G has
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only the identity and G as normal subgroups. The Standard Model of

particle physics is made up of products of simple groups.
Matrix representations were introduced above as a homomorphism from

a group G onto GL(n, R) or GL(n, C); these groups operate on a vector
space V over the real or complex numbers. A reducible representation is
one where the vector space contains an invariant subspace — one that
gets mapped onto itself; if the representation contains no such invariant
subspace it is called irreducible. Irreducible representations are the
building blocks for all finite-dimensional completely reducible
representations.
Here are a few additional facts about normal (invariant) subgroups and
their mappings:
Suppose that N is a normal subgroup of G. Then there is a bijective —

one-to-one and onto — mapping between irreducible representations of
G/N and irreducible representations of G having N in the kernel; i.e., N is
mapped onto the identity element.
The direct product of the groups G and N is written as G  N. If N is an
invariant subgroup of G, then the group G is the direct product of the
invariant subgroup N with the factor group G/N; that is, G = (G/N)  N.
Groups 7
A group G is the direct product of its subgroups, say N1 and N2, if N1 and
N2 are normal subgroups that are disjoint, that is, N1  N2 = Identity, and
they generate the group so that G = N1 N2, where N1 N2 = {n1 n2 | n1  N1,
n2  N2}.
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Chapter 2
A Semblance of the Dirac

Equation from Groups
In quantum mechanics particles are characterized by, in addition to their

positions in space and time: transformations which require the
introduction of the Lorentz group of special relativity; electric charge;
and transformations of any internal degrees of freedom such as spin. To
avoid the unnecessary complications that arise from the introduction of
the inhomogeneous Lorentz, or Poincare group (which generally includes
translations), the discussion to follow will be to a large extent restricted
to the proper orthochronous Lorentz group.
Eugene Wigner’s contributions to the role of groups in physics are

responsible for groups playing such an important role in the Standard
Model. In discussing Wigner’s classification of the irreducible
representations of the Poincaré group, the connection between groups
and elementary particle has been succinctly stated by Sternberg: “An
elementary particle ‘is’ an irreducible unitary representation of the group,
G of physics, where these representations are required to satisfy certain
physically reasonable restrictions . . . .”
9
It is assumed in what follows that the reader is familiar with Minkowski

space and special relativity, as well as the Dirac equation and its usual
derivation and solutions. Our purpose here is to show that a semblance of
the Dirac equation can be derived using only the properties of groups and
special relativity. The equation corresponds to the relationship between
the two spinors that come from the representations (½,0) and (0, ½) of
the Lorentz group. Those not familiar with the spinor representations of
the Lorentz group are directed to Appendix B.
The discussion below is based on that given in Ryder’s book on quantum

field theory listed in the bibliography.
Under a general Lorentz transformation, there are two types of

2-component spinors. They correspond to the right-handed, (½, 0), or
the left-handed, (0, ½), representations of the Lorentz group. These are
two-dimensional representations that are interchanged by Hermitian
conjugation. The 2-spinors associated with each representation can be
put together into a single 4-spinor with two components labeled R and
L designating right and left helicity, which is defined as the component
of spin in the direction of the momentum. With the constraints given
above, the 4-spinor would transform under a pure Lorentz transformation
without rotation (proper Lorentz transformations include a boost and a
rotation, which when composing non-colinear boosts leads to the
Thomas precession) as
 1 
 e2 • 0 R
 = R =  1  • ,
L 0 e 2 L
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A Semblance of the Dirac Equation from Groups 11
where  are the 22 Pauli matrices and  is the hyperbolic angle for the
Lorentz transformation; i.e., since 2 – 22 = 1, one may set  = cosh,
 = sinh, where  = (1v2/c2)1/2 and  = v/c. The reader is referred to
Appendix B or the group theory literature to fully understand how the
exponential forms in the transformation matrix arise.
Consider first R. If the exponent of the relevant exponential is written

as –(i/2) (i) and the exponential expanded one obtains
1   
R  e 2 • R = cosh   •n sinh R,
 
where n is a unit vector in the direction of the Lorentz boost. Now

assume initially that R(0) is transformed by the boost to R(p); i.e., that
the particle is initially at rest with momentum zero and the boost gives it
momentum p. Then from the hyperbolic half angle relations and the
definition of cosh and sinh given in the paragraph above, as well as the
fact that in units where c = 1 the total energy E of a particle with
momentum p is E =  m, and noting that p is in the same direction as n,
we obtain
E + m + •p
R p = 1 R 0 .
2
2m E + m
 1  •
Similarly, for L  e 2 L ,
E + m   •p
L p = 1 L 0 .
2
2m E + m
For (0), the distinction between left and right becomes meaningless
since for p = 0 there is no direction of momentum to which the spin can
be aligned. Consequently, one can set L 0 = R 0 . Using this and the
definition of the four momentum, p = (E,p), the last two equations
may be expressed in matrix form as
m p0 +  • p R p
= 0.
p0   • p m L p
Remembering that this is a four dimensional matrix (R, L, each have
two components while , and p have three) one may define the four
dimensional matrices
R p i
,    1 ,    i  ,
0 i
p =
L p 10  0
where 1 corresponds to the two by two identity matrix. With these
definitions, the previous matrix equation may be written as
0 i
 p0 +  pi  m  p = 0.
This is the promised semblance of the Dirac equation. It was derived

using only the properties of groups and special relativity. The equation
obtained corresponds to the relationship between the two spinors that
come from the representations (1/2,0) and (0,1/2) of the Lorentz group.
To get the actual Dirac equation one must introduce some minimal
elements of quantum mechanics.
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A Semblance of the Dirac Equation from Groups 13
It should be noted here that the derivation above uses the chiral
representation, so called because R and L are eigenstates of chirality
(the term “chirality” being equivalent to “handedness”). In the standard
representation, generally used to study the Dirac equation, the definitions
of the -matrices are different.
Chapter 3
Minimalist Quantum Mechanics
The origination of quantum mechanics dates back to Max Planck in 1900

and his studies of heat radiation that led him to introduce the postulate that
energy came in discrete, finite quanta of energy h. Planck was awarded
the 1918 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work but was never comfortable
with the idea of quanta. Nonetheless, essentially all of quantum theory
follows from special relativity and Planck’s discovery that E = h. We will
use this fact and de Broglie’s discovery of the wave nature of matter to
obtain what is required to convert the “almost Dirac equation” to the
quantum mechanical version.
De Broglie in his 1924 publication “Recherches sur la Théorie des

Quanta” introduced the thesis that elementary particles had associated
with them a wave, what we call the wave function, and what de Broglie
called an “onde de phase” or a phase wave. It is a consequence of the
relation E = h. In his 1929 Nobel lecture he used the following argument:
p =  mv =  mc v2 = E v2 .
2
c c
He now identifies the energy E of a massive particle with E = h to give
p = h2  .
c /v
15
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This identification is the key step used by de Broglie in deriving his

relation. Since the velocity of the massive particle is always less than that
of light, so that c2/v > c, he states that “qu’il ne saurait être question d’une
onde transportant de l’énenergie” (it is not a question of a wave
transporting energy). Consequently, he makes another key assumption that
c2/v corresponds to a phase velocity via vvph = c2, so that
p= h .
v ph/
Since vph = de Broglie obtains his fundamental relation  p = h.
The two relations, E = h and  p = h allow us to derive what is needed to

transform the “semblance of the Dirac equation” given above to the
quantum mechanical version of the Dirac equation. Start with a classical
wave packet propagating in the k direction,
i kr   t
 r,t = Fk e dk.
Now use the two quantum mechanical relations we have to transform this
to
i p r   t / h
 r,t = Fp e dp.
Take the time derivative to get one expression and the gradient to get a
second:
 r,t
= i
i pr   t / h
EF p e dp,
t h
 r,t = i
i pr   t / h
pF p e dp.
h
Minimalist Quantum Mechanics 17
 p = ih .
The first of these implies that E = ih t and the second that
By substituting these expressions for E and p into the expression for the
4-momentum p = (E,p) the semblance of the Dirac equation derived
above from special relativity and group theory alone becomes the actual,
quantum mechanical Dirac equation.
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Chapter 4
Gauge Principle
The gauge principle is fundamental to the standard model of particle

physics. All of the observed interactions of elementary particles and their
associated quanta are a result of vector fields created by the transition
from global to local gauge symmetries.
Let us begin with the electromagnetic field. It is well known today — for
example from the Aharonov and Bohm experiment, that in the presence
of an electromagnetic field the wave function of a charged particle
acquires a phase factor that depends on the vector potential A
a 4-vector,
  ie A  dx 
 x, t   x, t = e h  x, t .
It is also true that this transformation is equivalent to what is known as
“minimal coupling” — the replacement in the free particle Lagrangian
of the partial derivatives by the “gauge-covariant” derivative,
→ .
,
Writing the phase factor more generally as , if (x, t) is a
constant, then Ψ′ , is a solution of the free-particle wave equation.

This corresponds to a global phase invariance since  is constant
19
throughout space and time. Allowing  to have a space- time dependence

means we must introduce the electromagnetic field derivable from the
4-potential A. Put another way, if is replaced by in
the free-particle wave equation, the resulting wave equation can be made
gauge invariant if both of the equations
 x, t    x, t = e
ie x, t
 x, t
A   A  = A    x, t
are satisfied, thereby introducing a local phase invariance. The 4-vector
A´ that results from allowing  to have a space-time dependence lets
the vector potential be considered to be a gauge field, and the fact that
the interaction is determined by this field is known as the gauge
principle. This principle also holds for relativistic equations like the free-
particle Dirac equation

   + m  x = 0.
When the transformation → is made to this equation it introduces
the electromagnetic interaction, which, when radiative corrections are
included, has been found to be correct to many decimal places.
At this point, in order to generalize the covariant derivative for fields

other than electromagnetism, we need to introduce the idea that
continuous groups have infinitesimal group generators. Above we saw
that groups have parameters such as the angles of rotation. If all of the
parameters are set equal to zero, the group matrix representation
becomes the identity element of the group. For sufficiently small values
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Gauge Principle 21
of, say, k parameters i, an element of the group G() lying close to the
identity may be represented as a Taylor series expansion
k
G
G  G    i
i=1  i i =0
+...
where G(0) is the identity matrix. The infinitesimal group generators, Xi

are
Xi = G .
 i i = 0
Given the group generators, the vector potential A of electromagnetism
associated with the group U(1) may be generalized to other groups such
as SU(2) and SU(3), by using the generators of these groups to write
where the are ordinary vector fields and the Einstein summation
convention is used here and in what follows. Here there is a sum over the
repeated index i so as to include all generators of the group. The explicit
matrix form for the generalized vector potential will be discussed below.
The symmetry transformations that result from the group generators —

the first two terms of the expansion above with i taken to be very small
— are the infinitesimal part of what is known as a Lie group. It can be
shown that the generators obey the commutation relations
, ,
where the are a set of real constants called the structure constants,
which depend on the particular group. Such sets of commutation
relations comprise a Lie algebra. Note that the anti-symmetry of the
commutator implies that the are also antisymmeteric in the lower

indices i and j.
We will now need to find the form of the derivative D for non-Abelian
groups (where matrices of the representation do not commute).
Arbitrary Gauge Group Local Symmetry Transformations and

Corresponding Gauge Covariant Derivatives
Thus far we have the following ingredients for a gauge theory: A Lie
group G(x) having an independent copy assigned to each point x of
Minkowski space. In the mathematical literature, this type of structure is
known as a fiber bundle. The relationship between the group assigned to
each space-time point and the generators of the group, Xi, is
i
ie x X i
G x =e .
The space-time dependence is carried by the parameters i(x). As the

particle moves through a potential field, the group G(x) tells us how a set
of basis vectors in the “internal space” associated with the particle
changes. This internal space corresponds to internal degrees of freedom
associated with the particle such as isotopic spin.
The wave function of the particle can then be written as

i
 x = i x u ,
where the sum is over the set of internal space basis vectors ui. The index
i identifies components of an internal space quantity such as isotopic
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Gauge Principle 23
spin; i (x) should be thought of as a component of  (x) in the basis ui.

For an infinitesimal displacement in space-time,
i
iqd X i
G dx = e ,
where . q is the electric charge e for
electromagnetic gauge group U(1) or the coupling constant for an
arbitrary gauge group. As the particle moves from x to x +dx, the wave
function changes by
 i i
d x =   i x dx u +  i x du .
It is the second term on the right hand side of this equation that describes
the change in the basis vectors; the first is the change in in moving
from x to x +dx. Now the generators Xi are matrices that act on the
column vectors ui of the basis. This means that G(dx)ui can be written as
i iq    k x dx  X k ij j
G dx u = e u.
Remembering from the commutator discussion above that the matrices
representing the group generators must be antisymmetric, this can be
expanded to first order in dx as
i i i  j
u + du =  j  iq   x dx Xk
k
ij u.
For i = j, when the group generator matrix vanishes, becomes the

identity matrix and it is the only remaining term, vanishing otherwise.
The second term within the brackets corresponds to dui and allows the
introduction of the generalized vector potential,
A  ij =   x Xk ij.
k
The change in the wave function then becomes

 j
d x =    x  ij  iq A  ij  x dx u .
 ij has been introduced so as to allow the ui that appears in the first term
within the brackets to be factored out. Inspection of this equation tells us
that, if we introduce the gauge covariant derivative
D  j x =  ij   iq A  ij   x ,
it can be written as
 j
d x = D  j x dx u .
The last few equations have been written out in great detail. They can be
simplified considerably if the explicit matrix indices are suppressed so
that we would have instead the relations as they are usually found in the
literature:
k
A  = A  Xk,
 
d x =   x  iqA  x dx = D  x dx ,
D  =    iqA .
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Chapter 5
Standard Model Beginnings
The Standard Model brings together three of the fundamental forces of

nature. It is a gauge theory of strong and electroweak interactions. This
means that at each point of space-time there is an internal space attached.
From the mathematical point of view, the structure is that of a fiber
bundle with a Minkowski base space and a principal bundle consisting of
the gauge group. Individually, the groups involved are SU(3) for the
strong force, SU(2) for the weak force and U(1) for the electromagnetic
force. The symmetries involved with these groups are internal
symmetries of the internal space, the others being space-time symmetries
of the kind discussed above. These groups are usually written with
subscripts C, L, Y, and EM respectively, standing for color, left,
hypercharge, and electromagnetic. The restriction L reflects the fact that
nature does not seem to have right handed neutrino components.
When these groups are put together to represent the Standard Model, an
element g contained in the combination can be written
g  SU 3 C  SU 2 L  U 1 Y,
where 2 1 is the Glashow-Weinberg-Salam electroweak
symmetry group and U(1)Y is the phase group of weak hypercharge. This
symmetry can be “spontaneously” broken (to be discussed later) to U(1),
25
the phase group of the usual electric charge. The symbol  means the
direct product so that if ∈ 3 2 1 , one may
represent g as a 6  6 block diagonal matrix having the form
g1 0 0
g= 0 g 2 0 , g 1  SU 3 C, g 2  SU 2 L, g 3  U 1 Y.
0 0 g3
g1, g2, and g3 are elements contained in the simple groups SU(3)C,
SU(2)L, and U(1)Y, which have no non-trivial normal subgroups.
Some language: The local weak isospin symmetry SU(2)L governs the
weak interactions between quarks and leptons, while SU(3)C governs the
strong color interactions between quarks. Being spin ½ particles, quarks
obey a form of the Dirac equation. Weak isospin should not be confused
with the isotopic spin (or isospin) used by Heisenberg to describe the
symmetry between the neutron and the proton, which would transform
into one another under the spin ½ representation of SU(2). There is,
however, a close relation between Heisenberg’s isospin and weak isospin
in that a nucleon’s isospin is the sum of the weak isospins of its
constituent three quarks.
Isospin
If strong hadronic forces are charge independent, an isospin vector, I,

can point in any direction in isotopic space. In the case of the neutron
and proton, which are by definition distinguished by I3, the
charge operator Q corresponding to the electric charge q is
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Q = e(I3 + ½). Since the nucleons have spin ½, they have 2I + 1 = 2

possible orientations in isotopic space, so that I3 has the value of ½ or
½, and e(I3 + ½) has the value 0 or e.
In the Standard Model, members of the particle zoo are grouped into
isospin multiplets where each member of the multiplet is identified with
different orientation in isospin space in the same way as was done for the
proton and neutron. Charged current experiments show that the leptons
and associated neutrinos must be represented as left-handed “doublets”
of isotopic spin so that for three generations one has
e  
 ,  ,  
e L  L  L
The -meson, which has I = 1 so that there are 2I + 1 = 3 members of the

isospin multiplet, is consequently a triplet, corresponding to

+1 
3 
I = 0  .

1 
Here, the relationship between the charge and I3 is q = e I3. Gell-Mann

and Nishijima generalized this relation to include the strange particles by
assuming that the charge of other particles are related to I3 by a linear
relation of the form q = a I3 + b. The constant a is determined from
q = e I3 for pions as a = e. b can be found as follows: I3 has the range –I
to +I, giving the average charge of the multiplet as <q> = b. Only
particles with zero hypercharge have <q> = 0; otherwise, <q> = (½)eY ,
where Y is the hypercharge.† The generalization is then q = e (I3 + Y/2).

Expanded to include other quantum numbers (originally only baryon
number and strangeness) in addition to hypercharge, this is known as the
Gell-Mann Nishijima relation. In terms of operators, the weak
hypercharge Y is defined by
Q=T + Y,
3
2
3
T being an element of the SU(2)L Lie algebra defined above, and Q
being the charge operator that generates U(1)em.
First, consider 2 1 , the groups associated with electroweak
unification; the group SU(3)C will be discussed when the fundamental
particles of the Standard Model are introduced.
The Electro-Weak Group
The charge operator Q is associated with U(1)em, and similarly, the

hypercharge operator Y is associated with U(1)Y. As indicated by the
names, weak isospin and weak hypercharge come from the Gell-Mann
and Nishijima approach to forming SU(2) hadronic isospin multiplets.
Some terminology: Taken together, mesons and baryons are known as

hadrons. While mesons are made up of quark-antiquark pairs, baryons
† Hypercharge is defined as Y = B + S, where B is the baryon number and S is the
strangeness. Later in this book it will be seen that baryons are composed of three quarks,
u, d, and s, so that the baryon number of quarks is 1/3 (antiquarks, 1/3). Strangeness
counts the number of strange quarks or antiquarks comprising the states that make up a
particle’s wavefunction; e.g., the wavefunction for the K0 meson, | , has a

strangeness of +1, while that for the K , | , has strangeness 1.
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are composed of three quarks. Mesons have baryon number zero, which
is why they are composed of a quark and antiquark pair having baryon
number 1/3 and 1/3 respectively. Protons and neutrons, known as
nucleons, have an attracting force acting between them that is due to
residual color interactions. Only about one percent of the rest mass of
these nucleons is due to their constituent quark masses — the rest is due
to quark gluon interactions. The meaning of this will become clear in
what follows.
The idea of using the groups 2 1 was introduced by

Glashow in 1961 and predated the discovery of weak neutral currents.
Experiments indicate that in addition to the photon field A, the weak
interactions require three intermediate vector bosons mediating processes


such as the scattering of  by e and beta decay. Glashow’s work was
extended by Weinberg in 1967, and Salam in 1968, to include the


required bosons, the W , defined below, and the Z0. These gauge
particles are massless and are given masses by means of the introduction
of a scalar field called the Higgs field, which results in the spontaneous
symmetry breaking that, except for the photon and neutrino, give the
particles mass.
In order to achieve the unification under the Glashow-Weinberg-Salam

model of the weak and electromagnetic forces a new weak neutral
current interaction mediated by the Z0 was introduced for reasons having
to do with gauge invariance requirements related to the interaction

between the W+ with the W and the fact that the generators of the W+

and W do not commute. The existence of the weak neutral current
means that there is a weak force between electrons in addition to the

Coulomb force so that Coulomb’s law must be modified.
Including the new weak force in addition to the Coulomb force means
that the usual vector potential A of the U(1) group must be modified to
3
be a linear combination of the U(1) gauge field and the new field of
SU(2). The Standard Model uses the resulting isotriplet of vector fields
coupled with strength g to the weak isospin current , along with a
vector field B coupled to the weak hypercharge current with strength
conventionally taken to be g/2.
There are two observed currents, the electromagnetic current and the
neutral current . These will be expressed in terms of the two neutral

3
currents and belonging respectively to the symmetry groups SU(2)L
and U(1)Y. The following will indicate how this is done.
We now assume that both charged and neutral currents exist, that the
charged currents only couple between left-handed leptons, and that the

bosons mediating the weak interaction are the W and Z0, which are
massless at this point.
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Several fields will be introduced in what follows: , , are

the generators of SU(2)L, Y the generator of U(1)Y, and these generators
obey the commutation relations
i j k i
T , T = i ijkT , T , Y = 0.
, with i = 1, 2, 3 is an isospin triplet — meaning it is an isospin vector

and a 4-vector in space-time, which couples to the weak isospin current
i
J  , while B is an isospin singlet — meaning it is an isoscalar and a
4-vector in space-time that couples to the weak hypercharge current .


These fields will be used to form the physical particles Z0, W+ and W ,
the last two being defined as
W = 1 W  iW  , W = 1 W + iW  .
+ 1 2  1 2
2 2

The W+ and W fields are charged bosons, while and B are neutral
fields.
The leptons are left-handed doublets with isospin set equal to ½ and
T 3 =  ½ and right-handed singlets having zero isospin:
 l 1     l
= , l = e, , 
l L
2 l
1 + 
l R =  l,
2
where, for example, e corresponds to the electron neutrino
wavefunction.
The Pauli matrices,
 1 =     2 =  i   3 =   
 i   1
may be used to define the step up and step down operators
         
 
which are used to raise and lower the isotopic spin.
 l
Using doublet introduced above, one may introduce an isospin
l L
triplet of weak currents,
 
J  x = 1  l   i  l ,
i
i = 1, 2, 3.
2 l L l L
The corresponding charges,
i i 3
T = J 0 x d x,
generate an SU(2)L Lie algebra,

i j k
T , T = i ijkT .
The weak current introduced above cannot be identified with the

experimentally observed weak neutral current because the latter has a
right-handed component. The electromagnetic current is a neutral current
with both left- and right-handed components, and is given by,
em
e j = e Q
where Q is the charge operator having eigenvalue 1 for the electron.
The left-handed component belongs to an isotriplet and will be
associated with T3 and below, while the right-handed component is
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an isosinglet current that has both right and left-handed components.

Neither or obey SU(2)L symmetry. The idea now is to form two
orthogonal combinations of and the weak isospin singlet , that
have appropriate transformation properties under SU(2)L. is the weak
hypercharge current given by
Y
j =  Y 
which is unaffected by SU(2)L transformations.
The isospin doublet and singlet introduced above are now required to be
invariant under the local gauge transformations so that

 l 
 l =e
i x T
 l
= e   l ,
i x  
l L
l L
l l
 i x Y
l R  l R = e  l R.
Note that Ti = i/2 and that the operator Y, which generates the U(1)
group, is simply a constant Y. This gauge invariance will only hold if the
Lagrange density of the Dirac equation is also invariant under this
transformation. Now the leptons at this point are massless and will only
become massive under spontaneous symmetry breaking. As a result the
Dirac Lagrange density is obtained from the usual density by setting the
mass equal to zero. Using the left and right-handed split of the wave
function above, the resulting Lagrange density,

L = i  l    l
 
+ i  l R    l R,
l L l L
will only be gauge invariant if the derivative  is replaced by


g
D =    igT W  i Y B.
2
The photon field constructed from the two neutral fields must be
combined so that the physical state given by A is massless, and will
have the form
3
A  = Bcos w  W sin w
and the combination orthogonal to A is the combination corresponding
to the neutral intermediate boson of the weak interactions

3
Z  = Bsin w  W cos w
[The geometry is as follows: Draw a set of x,y-axes in the plane; label the x-axis Z and
the y-axis A draw the vector in the first quadrant at an angle  with respect to the
Z-axis and vector B orthogonal to in the 2nd-quadrant. The expressions for A and Z
follow from projecting and B on the Z and A axes.]
The last two equations may be inverted to give

B = A cos w  Z sin w
3
W = A sin w  Z cos w
The mixing angle W is known as the Weinberg angle. Note that Z is

0
often written as , Z0, or W0 in the literature.
The electroweak neutral current interaction, as indicated above, can be

written as
3 3 g Y
igJ  W   i j B.
2  
With a little algebra this can be put into the form
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The first bracketed term on the right hand side is the electromagnetic
interaction. From the definitions of , , , and Q above, one finds
the important relation
e j = e J  + 1 j .
em 3 Y
2
This must be the same as the first term bracket, so that both sin and
cos equal e, or tan / . This tells us that the couplings g
and g' may be replaced with e and W, where W is determined by
experiment.
Again, with a little algebra, the weak neutral current of the second
bracket may be written as
g 3 em 2
i J   j sin  Z .
cos
The expression in the brackets is defined as the observed weak neutral
current . Thus, it is possible to write the observed neutral current
as a sum of a left-handed component of SU(2)L and a right-handed
component taken from the electromagnetic current . The
electromagnetic current in turn may be written as the sum of
contained in SU(2)L and the weak hypercharge current , which is
invariant under SU(2)L and has only a right-handed component. The net
result is then
j = J  + 1 j
em 3 Y
2
NC 3 em 2
J  = J   j sin  .
Consider now the electron and its neutrino so that the wave functions are
 L = e with T = 1 and Y = 1

e L
2

R = e R with T = 0 and Y = 2.
The electroweak Lagrangian may then be written as
L1
where the last two terms correspond to the kinetic energy and self
coupling of the fields. This Lagrangian describes massless gauge bosons
and fermions. Gauge invariant masses are introduced by use of
spontaneous symmetry breaking.
Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking

Spontaneous symmetry breaking is in essence a consequence of
redefining the concept and nature of the vacuum. The Standard Model
introduces a vacuum significantly different from that of standard
quantum field theory. There, the vacuum state, 0, is the quantum state
where no particles are present. It is invariant under a unitary
transformation so that U 0 = 0. It was soon recognized, however, that
there was a problem with the quantum theory of fields. An operator, such
as the electric field , is not well defined, whereas “smeared” fields
such as
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E x, t f x dxdt = E f ,
where f is a smooth infinitely differentiable function, are well defined.

One possible way of interpreting this difficulty is that it is due to the
nature of the vacuum, which will be further discussed later in this book.
The implication is that the quantum field theoretic view of the vacuum
must be modified at small distances. This is precisely what lies at the
heart of symmetry breaking. By redefining the vacuum local gauge
symmetries may be “broken” resulting in gauge bosons gaining mass
through the Higgs mechanism.
With some reasonable assumptions on the transformation properties of

the Lagrangian, the Noether theorem tells us that if the Lagrangian has
some number of symmetries there will be the same number of conserved
currents and consequently, because of the equation of continuity, the
same number of conserved charges. This fact is the basis for proving an
important theorem by Goldstone, which has both a classical and quantum
mechanical formulation. The latter can be expressed as follows: If there
exists a field operator (x) such that the vacuum expectation value
<0|(x) |0>  0, and which does not transform as a singlet
(a 1-dimensional representation or a spin-zero state) under some
transformation group, then there exist massless particles in the spectrum
of states.
The vacuum state, 0, will no longer be defined as the quantum state
where no particles are present. Rather, it is assumed to be analogous to
the ground state of an interacting many body system, and will be defined
as the state of minimum energy so that the vacuum expectation value of

the Hamiltonian <0|H|0> is a minimum. It is the minimum of the
potential energy that will play the major role in what follows.
Furthermore, in quantum mechanics the ground state is non-degenerate.
In the case of quantum field theory, this will no longer be the case.
Degenerate orthogonal ground states, where tunneling between them is
not possible, will be allowed.
If the Lagrangian is invariant under a gauge group G and after symmetry

breaking the vacuum remains invariant under H  G, that is, a subgroup
of G, the number of massless Goldstone bosons is equal to the number of
symmetries that are broken. Equivalently, this is equal to the dimension
of the coset space dim(G/H) or the number of generators of G that are not
generators of H. The magic of symmetry breaking in the Standard Model
is that when the symmetry is local, so that the gauge transformations
depend on space-time, no Goldstone bosons appear, and instead the
symmetry breaking results in massive gauge bosons whose number is
equal to dim(G/H). The total number of gauge particles, both massive
and massless, is given by dimG.
While the Lagrangian of a system may be invariant under some

symmetry group, the vacuum state may not be invariant. The classical
example of this is the ferromagnet. Above the critical Curie temperature,
the spins are randomly oriented and the ground state is spherically
symmetric. Below the Curie temperature, the spins for each magnetic
domain are aligned and the ground state is no longer spherically
symmetric with regard to rotations. The rotational symmetry of the
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Hamiltonian is “spontaneously broken” to the cylindrical symmetry of

each magnetic domain along the direction of its magnetization. The
directions are random and have the same energy in the absence of an
external magnetic field. The vacuum or ground state is degenerate and
does not share the symmetry of the Hamiltonian.
An analogy often used in the literature is that of a superconductor, and in

the case of quantum chromodynamics one speaks of “color
superconductivity”. For the usual superconductor, one can show that
combining the London equation for the current with Maxwell’s equations
leads to a relation for the magnetic field penetration into the surface of a
superconductor whose solution is a decreasing exponential. This is
known as the Meissner effect. Its importance for spontaneous symmetry
breaking is that it transforms the long-range electromagnetic field into
one that, in the superconductor, has short range without violating the
gauge invariance of Maxwell’s equations. In addition, we know that
Yukawa showed that short-range forces correspond to massive quanta.
The superconductor is said to give the massless photon a “mass” within
the superconductor. In this way, superconductivity can be used as an
example of spontaneous symmetry breaking in the Abelian Higgs model.
The semi-classical approach used here to explaining spontaneously

broken symmetries will be to start with the Lagrangian for the field, put
in a special form for the potential that redefines the vacuum, and impose
symmetry requirements. Recall that if one puts the Lagrange density
(often simply called the Lagrangian) into the Euler-Lagrange equation,
one obtains the equation of motion. So, for example, substituting the
Lagrange density into the Euler-Lagrange
equation results in the Klein-Gordon equation 0.
Let us begin with global symmetry breaking, which means that gauge
transformations are not space-time dependent. The simplest example is
that of U(1). The general Lagrange density for a complex scalar field
is
  
L =      V  .
For the potential V, one chooses a form originally proposed by Ginzburg
and Landau before the BCS theory of superconductivity. This type of
potential was intended to represent the Helmholtz free energy of a
second order phase transition. The reason for choosing it here is that this
form of potential works to give the desired result (and possibly tells us
something about the nature of the vacuum) even though it was intended
as a phenomenological description of the free energy density of a
superconductor. In gauge theory it provides a type of self-interaction of
the Higgs field. As already noted, it also drastically redefines the nature
of the vacuum. It is given by
   
2
V   =     
The self-interaction comes from the  term. The extrema of this function
are found by taking the first and second derivative with respect to | and
setting the result equal to zero. Doing the algebra (and using the
definition of ) results in
2
  2 2 2
 =    1  2 =: a .
2
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a2 is real for the choice  > 0, 2 < 0, which we make here. There is also

the solution  =  = 0. Examining the second derivative tells us that this
solution is a relative maximum and that the solution at a2 = 2/2 is a

relative minimum. A sketch of the potential is shown below
V(ϕ*ϕ)
φ2
φ1
Massive
Mode ξ
Circle of Minimal Potential

(Massless Mode)
Although the components of  are drawn as coordinates, it should be

remembered that  is a field. The minima of the potential lie along the
circle of minimal potential of radius a that comprise a set of degenerate
vacua related by a rotation about the axis corresponding to the magnitude
of the potential. The potential along the circle, in the  direction tangent
to the circle, is constant. It therefore takes no energy to move along this
path and motion along it corresponds to the massless mode, while motion
in a plane containing the V-axis does take energy and corresponds to the
massive mode.
Let us now transform to polar coordinates so that

i x
 x = x e ,
where x is the space-time coordinate so that the same form holds at each
space time point. The vacuum is then <0|> = <0||0> = a and
<0||0> = 0. The degenerate vacua are then connected by a U(1)
symmetry transformation. Note that the U(1) phase symmetry is
destroyed as a result of the vacuum being given by the choice of  = a
and some particular value of ; it is the specification of  that breaks the
symmetry. We will be interested in small oscillations around the vacuum
state located at the circle of minimal potential. The quanta of these
oscillations correspond to physically interesting particles. Because the
minimum of the potential lies at a radial distance a from the origin, the
following transformation is made:
i x
 x =  x + a e .
As a result the vacuum is now <0|´|0> = <0||0> = 0. When this  is

then substituted into the Lagrangian given above there results, after a bit
of algebra, a kinetic term and the potential term
  
V =    + 4a   a    a 
2 4
The quadratic term in ´ implies that ´ has a mass of 4a2. Spontaneous

symmetry breaking has generated this mass. Notice that there is no
similar term in 2, implying that  is a massless field. This can be
thought of as being a consequence of there being no restoring force in the
-direction. 1 and 2 started out as two fields satisfying the Klein-
Gordon equation. After symmetry breaking we have a massive field ´
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and a massless field . This is an example of the group theoretic

requirements set out above. Another example or two might be helpful.
Let the symmetry group be SO(3). A Lagrangian for a Lorentz invariant,

massive isovector scalar field is
2

L = 1  i i  ii   ii ,
 2
2 2
where i = 1,2,3. After symmetry breaking, we get a degenerate isospin
vacuum state, and must choose one. Once this direction in isospace is
chosen the vacuum is no longer invariant under the three generators of
SO(3) but only under rotations about the fixed axis in isospace. We
started out with three massive fields and after symmetry breaking have
only one, corresponding to the fixed axis in isospace. Two Goldstone
bosons appear corresponding to the loss of symmetry about the two other
axes. Thus, three massive scalar fields result in one massive scalar field
and two massless scalar fields.
If we demand that the Lagrangian above be invariant under a local rather

than global gauge transformation so that → , the derivative
must be changed to the covariant derivative thereby introducing
additional terms into the Lagrangian. This results in the Lagrangian
taking the form
2

L = 1 D i D i  ii   ii  1 F F ,
 2 i i
2 2 4
where
j i i i ijk j k
D i =  i + g ijk A k, F =  A     A  + g A A  .
Here we are starting with three massive scalar fields i and three
massless vector fields . After symmetry breaking, there is again a
degenerate vacuum state and after choosing a direction in isospace, say
3, there remains only one massive scalar field 3. But instead of two
Goldstone bosons, we find that two of the vector fields have become
massive and one remains massless. The vacuum remains invariant only
under U(1), the group with one generator, corresponding to the one
massless vector field.
The Weinberg-Salam Model and Gauge Field Masses

The introduction of the symmetry breaking Higgs field in the Weinberg-
Salam electroweak theory, is perhaps its most important feature. Mass is
generated for gauge bosons by their interaction with the Higgs field. This
mechanism is also used to produce quark masses in QCD and thus
redefines the nature of the vacuum down to very small distances. The
Higgs field has a totally unknown origin and is simply postulated by
analogy to examples such as those discussed above.
The electroweak Lagrangian was given above as
L 1 =  L i   1 g W + 1 g B  L + e R i  + g B e R 

   
2 2
 1 W W  1 B B .
 
4 4

The aim now is to use the Higgs formalism to give the W and Z0 mass
while leaving the photon massless. If a scalar field is to be used for

spontaneous symmetry breaking, an appropriate Lagrangian having
2 1 gauge invariance, for the scalar field must be added to the
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above Lagrangian for the scalar field. It will look very similar in form to
the above except that the kinetic energy terms will be eliminated. The
scalar Lagrangian is
†
L 2 =   + ig W + i 1 g B   + ig W + i 1 g B
2 2

2 † †
     
Here, represents four real scalar fields i that — following Weinberg —
are used to form an isospin doublet with weak hypercharge Y = 1; that is,
 : = 1 1 + i2
+
+
 2
 0 , .

0
 := 1 3 + i4
2
The potential with 2 < 0 and  > 0 will cause spontaneous symmetry
breaking, as discussed above, leaving a local SU(2) gauge freedom that
can transform 1, 2, and 4 away so that
0
 .
3 + a
The vacuum expectation value, 0, is then
0 = 0  0  1 0a .
2
This is known as the Higgs vacuum or ground state and is assumed
ab initio to be electrically neutral to guarantee that the photon remains
massless. It does however carry weak hypercharge and isotopic spin in

order to interact with the Z0, W+ and W fields. It should also be noted
that when these fields are massless, they only have spin components
parallel and antiparallel to the momentum, but after symmetry breaking
they gain an additional transverse spin component.
Remembering the Gell-Mann-Nishijima relation,
Q=T + Y,
3
2
we see that with the choice of T = | T | =1/2, T3 = 1/2, and Y = 1 the
charge operator Q that generates U(1)em will yield zero when operating
on 0. This means that the vacuum will remain invariant under U(1)em
local gauge transformations since for any value of (x),
0  0 = e
i x Q
0 = 0.
Because this is the case, the photon remains massless.
The gauge boson masses are obtained by substituting 0 into the
Lagrangian L2 above. The relevant term in L2 with Y = 1 is

†
ig W + i 1 g B ig W + i 1 g B .
2 2
Putting in the matrices and remembering that Ti = i/2, where the i are
the Pauli matrices, results in
†
3 1 2 3 1 2
gW + g B
 g W  iW
  gW + g B g W  iW
i 0 0 .
2 1 2 3 1 2 3
g W + iW gW + g B g W + iW gW  + g B
Going through the matrix algebra yields

2 2 2
1 a 2g 2 W 1 + W 2 + 1 a g B  gW .
2 3
 
8 8
The first term can be written as

2
1 ag W +W .

2
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Since we are working in Minkowski space, the  index can be raised or

lowered as needed to improve clarity. Remembering the Lagrange
density for the Klein-Gordon equation, ,
and comparing the mass term with the above, tells us that
1 2 1
2
, so that .
2 2
2
1 2
The second term, 8 a g B  gW
3
, is transformed by use of the
relations
B = A cos W  Z sin W
3
W = A sin W  Z cos W 
described earlier in this book, into
2
1 a2 A g 
8  cos W  gsin W  Z  gcos W  g sin W .
If the photon is to remain massless, the term cos sin must

vanish. This will be the case, and the requirement that sin
cos 1 will be satisfied, if
g g
sin W  2
and cos W  .
g + g
2 2 2
g + g
Substituting these into the remaining term gives

2 2
2 g + g
1 a 2Z 2 gcos  g sin = 1a
2
Z  = 1 M Z Z .
2 2 2

8 W W
2 4 2
The mass of the neutral Z is then

1
2 2 2
g + g
MZ = a .
2
A neutral vector boson has the same form of mass term as that in the
Lagrangian of the Klein-Gordon equation, which can be generalized to
several fields having a vector or spinor character.
What has happened here is that the electroweak symmetry group has
been dynamically broken to yield the electromagnetic group, that is
 U 1 Y  U 1 EM ,
SB
SU 2 L
while keeping the photon massless,
along with generating mass for the W and Z bosons.
Thus far we have found the masses of the bosons but not the fermions.
The problem is that the mass term in the free field Dirac equation
destroys gauge invariance under all gauge transformations and in
particular under SU(2)L. As a result it was excluded in the Lagrangian L1
above, which was for massless fermions and gauge bosons. In somewhat
simplified notation, the electron mass term would be m e e Le R + e Re L .
Because eR is a singlet and eL a member of an isospin doublet, this term
cannot be gauge invariant.
The way around this problem is to introduce a coupling between the

originally massless fermion fields and the Higgs field. The procedure for
giving mass to the lepton and quark fermions is the same as above
although there will be no way to predict the strength of the coupling,
which becomes a parameter that must be fixed by the observed masses.
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With a slight change in notation from that given above, we defined the
wavefunctions

 L = ee ,  R = e R.
L
Remembering that the Higgs field is

+

 0 ,


and that the complex conjugate of + is  , the following Lagrangian
must be added to L1 given above:

  e
L 3 = G e  e, e e R + e R   0
e
.
L
0 L
One again goes through the process of symmetry breaking using the
potential discussed above and substitutes
0
  .
 a+h x
The Higgs doublet has been reduced to the neutral field h(x) and after
again using the gauge freedom to transform 1, 2, and 4 away, the
Lagrangian L3 becomes
Ge G
L3 =  a e Le R + e Re L  e e Le R + e Re L h.
2 2
The electron mass is then given by choosing Ge such that .

√2
Masses for the quarks that appear in the quantum chromodynamics

(QCD) discussion below are obtained in the same way except that there
are some changes in the choice of the Higgs doublet to generate the mass
for the upper member of a quark doublet. The masses associated with the
up and down quarks, which make up protons and neutrons are quite
small and to a good approximation can be set equal to zero. Most of the
mass of the proton and neutron come from the relativistic motion of their
constituent quarks and the energy in the color gluon fields that govern
their interaction.
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Chapter 6
Particles of the Standard Model and QCD
Let us now list the fundamental particles of the Standard Model.

The Gauge group is 3 2 1 ⟹8 3 1
Gauge bosons.
 
The 12 gauge bosons are the W , Z , the photon , and 8
gluons all having spin equal to 1. Three generations of Quarks

and Leptons:

u d e e

c s  

t b  
In addition, the quarks and gluons carry three conserved color

charges (r, b, g), and antiquarks carry anticolor ̅ , , ̅ . The u,
c, and t quarks carry a charge in terms of e of +2/3, while the d,
s, and b quarks have a charge of 1/3.
And finally, one must introduce the spin-zero Higgs boson for
the Higgs field needed to generate masses.
Excluding the Higgs, this is summarized in the following table:
51
Both left-handed and right-handed quarks form triplets under SU(3)C,

while left-handed quarks are doublets under SU(2) and right-handed
quarks are singlets under SU(2). Leptons do not participate in strong
interactions and are therefore color singlets under SU(3)C.
The six leptons of the Standard Model, e, e, , , , , interact
 
through electromagnetic and weak forces. The gauge bosons W and Z
associated with 2 1 are massless, but the weak interactions

are known to have a short range, and the form of the Yukawa potential,
em/r/r, tells us that these must be massive. On the other hand, it can be
shown that they must be massless to preserve gauge invariance. As we
have seen, this conundrum is resolved in the Standard Model by
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spontaneous symmetry breaking with the Higgs field. This results in the
 
W and the Z gauge bosons acquiring mass, the photon remaining
massless, and most importantly, results in a theory that is renormalizable.
All strongly interacting particles are composed of three quarks, while the
mesons are a bound state of a quark and antiquark. But then there is a
problem since quarks obey Fermi-Dirac statistics so that the Pauli
principle forbids the existence of states with three identical quarks. The
++ is such a state, and to resolve the contradiction the new quantum
number of color was introduced.
The use of the term color charge can be a bit misleading. Charge in
electromagnetism is a scalar quantity. In QCD, color charge is a quantum
vector charge and the composite color charge of some configuration of
quarks is similar to that of combining angular momentum in quantum
mechanics. The three color states form a basis in a 3-dimensional
complex vector space. The color state can be rotated by elements of
SU(3). The strong interactions in nature rule out states that are not color
neutral — all are color singlets.
Quarks interact via gluons, massless, spin one particles that can be either
left or right handed, carry color charge, and can therefore interact with
each other. Quarks carry a color charge whereas antiquarks carry
anticolor. One rule is that there is color conservation at a quark-gluon
interaction vertex, which tells us that gluons carry not only a color
charge but also an anticolor charge. The colors are often designated as
red, blue, and green.
An example of an interaction between two quarks is shown below where

only the color exchange is indicated:
rb
b
rb b
r
The arrows along the gluon symbol indicate from which vertex the gluon
originates, so that the symbol means that one starts from the left
vertex and goes to the right one. The opposite is true for the symbol ̅
with the arrow below it. As one can see, there is color conservation at
each vertex. Such diagrams for an individual vertex are often drawn as in
the figure below (but, as we will see, the other side of the diagram should
not be forgotten):
b
rb
br
r
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Let the three color states be represented in Dirac notation as |r>, |b>, |g>.
Then the vertex above (changing a red quark to a blue one) going from
left to right can be represented as
|b
|G
|r
The Lagrangian will have terms in it that depend on the SU(3) covariant
ఒೖ
derivative, the key term being ߲ െ ݅ ‫ܩ‬௞ , where Gk is the creation
ଶ
operator for a Gk gluon, and the k are the Gell-Mann matrices
010 0 i 0 1 0 0
1 = 1 0 0 , 2 = i 0 0 ,  3 = 0 1 0 ,
000 0 0 0 0 0 0
001 0 0 i 000
4 = 0 0 0 , 5 = 0 0 0 , 6 = 0 0 1 ,
100 i 0 0 010
0 0 0 1 0 0
 7 = 0 0 i ,  8 = 1 0 1 0 .
0 i 0 3 0 0 2
These matrices are essentially the generators of the SU(3) group.
If one thinks of r, b, g as creation operators that create the states |r>, |b>,
|g> from the vacuum, then the vertex in the figure above has
corresponding to it the expression <0 rG 1b 0>, where the terms between
the bra and ket vectors should be interpreted, from left to right, as
“annihilate an r quark”, “create a G1 gluon”, and “create a b quark”. The
missing vertex on the right-hand side will give a similar term

<0 bG 1r 0> .
r
Let the general color state vector in SU(3)C be represented as b , with
g
Hermitian conjugate r, b, g . Because of the k Gk term, the
Lagrangian will contain terms of the form
r
  kG k = r, b, g  kG k b .
g
This allows us to find the form of the Gk gluons. For example for k = 1,
010 r
  1G 1 = r, b, g 1 0 0 G 1 b = bG 1r + rG 1b.
000 g
Consider the first term on the right hand side operating on the vacuum so
that we have <0 bG 1r 0> . Similar to the description given for the
vacuum expectation value of the second term in the paragraph above, this
means, from left to right, “annihilate a b quark”, “create a G1 gluon”, and
“create a r quark”. The vacuum expectation value must be colorless so
that <0 bG 1r 0> implies that G 1~ br; and <0 rG 1b 0> implies that
G 1~ rb . If G1 is to fulfill the requirement for both vertices it must then
be composed of the terms rb and br. The combination is generally
1
written G 1 ~ 2 rb + br . Going through the same procedure for the
rest of the i results in
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G 1 ~ 1 rb + br G 2 ~ i br  rb G3 ~ 1 rr  bb ,
2 2 2
G4 ~ 1 gr + rg G 5 ~ i gr  rg G6 ~ 1 bg + gb ,
2 2 2
G 7 ~ i gb  bg G 8 ~ 1 rr + bb  2gg .
2 6
These gluon states are independent in the sense that they cannot be
combined to yield one not in the list. Notice that the three by three
identity matrix does not appear in the list of i. It would result in a long-
1 rr + bb + gg
range colorless singlet state 3 , which does not appear
and is not observed in nature. The Gk can also be computed by using

r
G k = r, b, g  k b ,
g
or by defining the “color matrix”
rr rb rg
C= 1 br bb bg ,
2
gr gb gg
∗
and using the expansion . There are eight gluons because
gluons transform in the adjoint representation of SU(3), which is
8-dimensional. Since gluons carry color charge, in principle they can
bind together to form colorless states known as “glueballs”.
Similar to the W± charged bosons in the electroweak case, one may

define, for example, ∓ , and similarly for the pairs G4,
√
G5 and G6, G7. As seen above in the diagrams, these represent the flow of
color charge when quarks exchange gluons. There is a set of Feynman
rules for QCD that govern quark-quark scattering of various types.
The commuting generators in the i defined above are 3 and 8. The fact
that they commute tells us these generators are associated with two
additional simultaneously observable quantum numbers.
When hadrons are considered, these quantum numbers
are defined as I 3 = 1  3 and Y = 1  8 giving the weights

2 3
I 3 = + 1 ,  1 ,0 and Y = 1 , 1 ,  2 . Now define the raising and

2 2 3 3 3
lowering operators
I  = 1  1  i 2 , U  = 1  6  i 7 , V = 1  4  i 5 .
2 2 2
Consider the operation of I+ on the blue color vector:
0 010 0 1 r
1  + i b = 0 0 0 1 = 0 = 0 .
2 1 2
0 000 0 0 0
The I+ operator thus converts blue to red. Similarly, using the other
raising and lowering operators and color vectors results in the scheme
shown below.
I+b=r
b Ir=b r
U+g=b V+g=r
Ub=g Vr=g
g
The SU(3)C wavefunctions for the combinations like rb are the exact
analogues of the SU(3) wavefunctions for quark-antiquark combinations
like dd. With the identification
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r u
b  d ,
g s
one can define color hypercharge and isospin for the three color and
three anti-color states for quarks:
C C
YC I3 YC I3
r 13 12 r 1  3 1  2
b 1  3 1  2 b 1  3 1  2
g 2  3 0 g 23 0
These color isospin and hypercharge charges should not be confused

with flavor isospin and hypercharge for the quarks. We now shift to a
discussion of quarks.
Because the quark masses compared to that of hadrons are very small,
the flavor-independent color force dominates their interactions. Thus if
we choose the quark basis as
1 0 0
u= 0 , d= 1 , and s= 0 ,
0 0 1
we can, remembering the weights given for 3 and 8 above, make the
following table (compare with the table for color just above):
Q Y I3 Q Y I3
u 23 13 12 u 2  3 1  3 1  2
d 1  3 1  3 1  2 d 1  3 1  3 1  2
s 1  3 2  3 0 s 13 23 0
Q is again the electric charge. Quarks have baryon number 1/3, while
antiquarks have baryon number 1/3, so that mesons, composed of a
quark and antiquark, have baryon number zero. The way Q is determined
is to make use of the same definitions given above in the discussion of
1
color, 3 and . In doing so we are using the two
2 3 √
additional simultaneously observable quantum numbers also mentioned

above. Then, remembering the Gell-Mann-Nishijima relation,
Q = I3 + Y ,
2
we see that Q is given by the matrix
2 0 0
3
Q= 0 1 0 .
3
0 0 1
3
Given the definition of the quark basis vectors above, we see that the u,
d, and s quarks will have electric charges 2/3, -1/3, and -1/3 respectively.
The weight diagram will look similar to that for color above:
Y
I+d=u
Iu = d
d u
I3
U+s=d V+s= u
Ud=s Vu = s
s
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The quarks are located at positions consistent with the table above. In
any given irreducible representation, the states corresponding to the
various particles are characterized by the eigenvalues of I3 and Y. The
effect of the “shift operators” on these states follow from the
commutation relations and can be summarized as:
I± results in the changes Y = 0, I3 = ±1, i.e.,
I  I 3, Y  I 3  1, Y .
U± results in the changes Y = ±1, I3 = (±1/2), i.e.,
U  I 3, Y  I 3   1  2, Y  1 .
V± results in the changes Y = ±1, I3 = ±1/2, i.e.,
V I 3, Y  I 3 1  2, Y  1 .
A simplified version of the diagram above is called the fundamental

representation for quarks and is designated as 3, and the diagram for
antiquarks, is designated as 3, as shown below. Often, the axes and
quark labels are also omitted, but are shown in this figure for clarity.
Y Y
S
d u
3= I3 3= I3
d u
s
The scale for Y and I3 in such diagrams is chosen so that the shift
resulting from the application of the shift operator V+ is inclined by 60o.
Now we come to a few aspects of what might be termed “diagramatica”.

To specify a representation or multiplet of SU(3) one must give the sites
in the Y-I3 plane, as is done in the figures above, which are to be
occupied, and with what multiplicity (how many states can occupy a
given position). This is known as a weight diagram. Generally multiplets
are triangular as above or have a hexagonal symmetry as shown below
for the large multiplet 81.
Y
Layer 1
1 1 1 1 1 1
Layer 2
1 2 2 2 2 2 1
Layer 3
1 2 3 3 3 3 2 1
1 2 3 3 3 2 1
I3
1 2 3 3 2 1
1 2 3 2 1
1 2 2 1
1 1 1
The circles in the figure designate the multiplicity for each site, which
are the same on a given layer. The rule is that every site on and inside a
boundary is occupied by at least one state, and that when a triangular
layer is reached the multiplicity on and inside the triangle have the same
multiplicity. Each pattern that satisfies this rule corresponds to only one
irreducible representation of SU(3). The fact that multiplicities greater
than one occur means that another quantum number in addition to Y and
I3 is needed to distinguish them. The choice made is the total isotopic
spin so that any state of an SU(3) irreducible representation is completely
and uniquely characterized as |I, I , Y .
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Representation Products
Multiparticle states are obtained by taking the product of irreducible

representations. There is a graphical method of obtaining products of
representations best illustrated by an example. Consider the product
3  3 . Graphically, the product is interpreted as “put the origin of 3 on
each node of 3. The result looks like the figure below.
Y Y
3× 3 = 2
I3 = I3 +
3× 3 = 8 + 1
Comparison with the general multiplet figure above, shows that the
weights on the boundary (formed by adding the dotted lines) have unit
multiplicity, as they should. The original 3 diagram in blue is now
eliminated leaving the center with a multiplicity of three. According to
the second part of the rule, for an irreducible representation it should be
two, so this nonet must reduce to an octet and a singlet as shown in the
figure on the right.
The way the various quarks fit into this scheme can be seen by plotting
the values for Y and I3 of the quarks and antiquarks given in the table
above. The figure above then becomes
Y
+1 ds us ds us
0 du ud = du ud +
(uu, dd, ss)
–1 su sd su sd
–1 – 12 0 + 12 +1 I3
3 × 3 = 8 + 1
This example can be applied to the meson octet composed of quark-

antiquark pairs, as shown below (s is the strangeness, and the I3 values
running from left to right are 1, 1/2, 0, 1/2, and +1.
K0 K+
s=1 x x
0
s=0 π –x xπ x π
+
xη
s = –1 x x
K– K0
Each of the mesons corresponds to a colorless quark-antiquark

combination.
We have seen above that the properties of SU(3) gave us the result that
3  3 = 1   . Similarly, if we want to combine three quarks to form
baryons we would have 3  3  3 = 1       . This can
be seen in two steps: first 3  3 = 6  3 ; followed by
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333=3 63 =3633=36 . One
can then show using the graphical techniques above that 3  6 =    ,

so the result stated follows. It looks like:
ddd uuu
+ + +
sss
10 + 8 + 8 + 1
Note that the center of each figure is at Y = 0, I3 = 0 and I3 changes in

steps of ½ from the origin so that the states indicated by the dots have I3
values ranging from 3/2 to 3/2. The decuplet figure on the left consists
of an I = 3/2 quartet with Y = 1, a triplet with I = 1 and Y = 0, an isospin
doublet with Y= 1, and an isospin singlet (I = 0) with Y= 2.
Were SU(3) a perfect symmetry, the 27 particles associated with this

product would have the same mass, but the symmetry is not perfect. The
symmetry is broken by the large mass of the strange quark compared to
that of the up and down quarks.
The completely antisymmetric singlet has a form that can be expressed

as 1 uds  usd + sud  sdu + dsu  dus . There is an analogous
6
color singlet with the form 1 rgb  grb + gbr  bgr + brg  rbg .
6
This color singlet is common to all hadrons and in particular to all
baryons. Earlier it was noted that the ++ with J3 = 3/2 is described by the
symmetric wave function uuu . This is symmetric, but it should be
antisymmetric under exchange of identical quarks. The addition of the
color singlet state to the overall wave function makes it antisymmetric. In
general the inclusion of this color singlet in the overall wave function
means that only symmetric representations of the remaining product of
factors (space spinflavor) in the wave function can be used.
There is a great deal more to the graphical representation used above and
its relation to group theory. But the brief introduction given above is
perhaps enough to set the stage for approaching the literature and the
physics as it evolved historically. In addition many topics have been
ignored, such as quark orbital angular momentum and complexities
related to spin and quark magnetic moments.
The Standard Model is perhaps the greatest achievement of modern

physics. This book does not even begin to cover the enormous work of
the many hundreds, if not thousands, of people over many years that
allowed the many experimentally observed particles to fit into the group
structure of the Standard Model. Almost all of the physics involved in
this achievement has been ignored.
There are, however, some issues that the Standard Model does not even
address as well as significant conceptual problems raised by the nature of
the vacuum. We begin with the issue of color confinement and then
move on to the broader conceptual problems.
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Color Confinement
Because the gluons of QCD carry color charge, unlike photons, they
have three and four gluon self-interactions as illustrated below.
These interactions are thought to be responsible for color confinement,

asymptotic freedom (meaning that the quark-quark interaction becomes
weaker at short distances allowing perturbation theory to be applicable),
and chiral symmetry breaking. Zero-mass quarks would travel at the
speed of light and their spin can be aligned either along the direction of
motion or opposite to it. This handedness, or chirality, is Lorentz
invariant, and this symmetry is explicitly broken when the quark mass is
not neglected.
The color potential for quark-quark and quark-antiquark interactions is

given by
 
quarkquark: V r = +C rS quarkantiquark: C rS .
An overall minus sign, including that of C, is binding. The constant C

can be determined from the components of the i matrices, summed over
the complete set of matrices, as

C ik  jl = 1   ij kl.
a a
4 a=1
One readily calculates that, for example,
C rr  rr = 1 C rg  rg =  1 C rg  gr = 1
3 6 2
C rr  rr = 1 C rg  rg =  1 1
C rr  gg = .
3 6 2
One can show that for color singlet mesons given by the wavefunction
 > = 1 rr + gg + bb ,
3
one gets the potential

Vqq r =  4 rS,
3
which is negative so that for short ranges the color singlet mesons are
bound. On the other hand, for the quark-antiquark states in the color
  rb 1
octet, for example and for which C rb  rb =  6 , one
gets the potential


Vqq r = 1 rS ,
6
so that the short-range potential is repulsive.
The overall quark-antiquark potential, important for quark and color

confinement, is illustrated below:
V(r)
4 αs λ r
VQCD = – +
3 r
1 fm
r
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At small distances, r < 1fm, the potential is coulomb like, but it becomes
proportional to the separation at larger distances, corresponding to r >
1fm.  is the constant of proportionality and s is the strong coupling
constant, which is not a true constant but rather a “running constant” that
decreases with increasing Q, the 4-vector energy momentum transfer of
the interaction. To first order it is given by
s = 12 ,
33  2N f ln Q 
2 2
where Nf is the number of allowed quark “flavors” and  is an

experimentally determined scale parameter (~0.2 GeV). Experimentally,
s as a function of energy looks like:
0.4
0.3
αS (μ)
0.2
0.1
0.0
1 2 5 10 20 50 100 200
μ (GeV)
The linear nature of the potential at large distances compared to 1fm tells
us that the lines of force between gluons are squeezed together into a
“flux tube” having constant energy density per unit length governed by
the constant . The chromoelectric field thus has a string-like character
as shown below. As a result, quark-antiquark pairs cannot be separated,
but as the distance between them increases, the energy stored in the
gluon field will exceed a threshold where the pair will break into two
pairs, a process known as hadronisation or fragmentation. A notional
idea is given by the following sketch:
Note that the flavor of the quarks in this figure is not specified. If the
flavor is the same for the quark and antiquark, it is possible for the pair to
mutually annihilate.
One explanation for the formation of the flux tube is that gluon-gluon
self-interactions squeeze the flux lines together. Individual gluons that
comprise the “chromoelectric field” illustrated in the figure carry color.
Color-anticolor pairs of gluons are color neutral and should strongly
attract each other. Also, anti-symmetric states of unlike color charges are
attractive while symmetric states are repulsive.
Another possibility is that there exists a vacuum screening current — in

analogy with the screening current for magnetic fields in conventional
BCS superconductors — except that it would be the chromoelectric field
that would be excluded or confined to the equivalent of a single vortex
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flux line in a type II superconductor. (An array of flux lines would not be
expected to be an analogue since the individual flux vortices in a
conventional type II superconductor are mutually repulsive.)
Yet another approach to understanding color flux-tube formation is to

think of the vacuum as a dual color superconductor. The term comes
from the fact that in electromagnetism the duality operation exchanges
electric and magnetic fields, and here a dual superconductor is defined as
a superconductor in which the roles of the electric and magnetic fields
are interchanged. In the usual superconductor, it is the condensation of
Cooper pairs formed from the pairing of negatively charged electrons
that results in the superconductivity responsible for the Meissner effect;
the concept of a dual superconductor has magnetic charges instead of
electrons that form boson pairs that condense to form a color
superconductor that is thought to be responsible for the analogue of the
BCS Meissner effect, and would therefore be expected to exclude color
electric fields. It is Gauss’ law that prevents the color-electric field from
disappearing completely. The most important difficulty with this idea is
that there is no evidence that color-magnetic charges exist, and the
contention that their condensation would lead to the confinement of
quarks remains highly speculative. Even so, the vacuum does seem to
have the properties, at least conceptually, of such a dual superconductor.
There is some expectation that a color superconductor, albeit not a dual

color superconductor, could exist. It is possible that matter at ultra-high
densities could be described in terms of a color superconductor. In the
central regions of some stars, baryons could approach close enough that
their wave functions would overlap, and with increasing density the
quarks comprising the baryons would become mobile, ultimately
resulting in a quark-gluon plasma, for which there is experimental
evidence. The explanation of superconductivity goes something like this:
At sufficiently low temperature and high density the quarks would form
a degenerate Fermi liquid. Because quarks interact only weakly at short
distances (asymptotic freedom), quarks near the Fermi surface are almost
free and, unlike electrons in a BCS superconductor, already have a weak
attraction. It is argued that the weak attraction under these conditions is
sufficient to allow quarks to pair up as bosons so that they could undergo
condensation for color superconductivity to appear. Because pairs of
quarks cannot be color neutral, the condensate will break the local color
symmetry making the gluons massive. The quark pairs would play the
same role as the Higgs particle in the standard model.
Here is a notional idea of what the phase diagram for such strongly
interacting matter might look like:
quark–gluon plasma
Tc
mesonic
matter quark
plasma
nuclear
matter
color superconductor
µc µ
Tc is the critical temperature and  the chemical potential, defined as the

partial derivative of the energy with respect to particle number at
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constant entropy and volume. As one can see, for low enough
temperature and high enough density, a color superconductor is expected
to form.
Problems with the Standard Model

There are a number of questions that are not answered in the Standard
Model: Why are there three families of quarks and leptons? What is the
relationship, if any, between quarks and leptons? There are three
arbitrary coupling constants associated with the constituent gauge groups
of the Standard Model whose value has to be put in by hand. Because the
Weinberg mixing angle is arbitrary, there is significant mixing —
making the weak and electromagnetic forces appear related — only
because experiment shows the coupling constants are of the same order
of magnitude. The situation would be different if the mixing angle was
close to zero or /2. The quantization of charge is not explained since it
is put into the theory arbitrarily when assigning values to the weak
hypercharge. The Standard Model requires only one Higgs boson, but
going beyond the model there may be an expanded “Higgs sector” with a
number of Higgs bosons, neutral as well as charged. At this point there is
no strong evidence for an expanded Higgs sector. In the Standard Model,
neutrino masses are zero; yet there is good experimental evidence for
small neutrino masses and for neutrino oscillations — where neutrinos
change their flavor. The most popular approach to these problems is to
assume the fields of the Standard Model are fundamental, but that they
are related by additional symmetries that are broken at higher energy
scales. None have yet proved satisfactory.
A Few Metaphysical Thoughts
Perhaps the greatest fundamental problem with the Standard Model is

that its redefinition of the vacuum begins to make it look like some form
of aether, albeit a relativistic one! One begins to wonder whether the
imposition of analogies from condensed matter physics, and in particular
superconductivity, are not unwarranted. Surely they should not be taken
literally. The fact that they “work”, in the sense of supplying an intuitive
mechanism, should instead be simply taken as a hint about the real nature
of the vacuum. The “vacuum”, of course, is just another name for the
space-time continuum in the context of quantum field theory, and about
which we know very little except for what hints we have from relativity
and those given by its definition in the Standard Model.
That there was some problem with the foundations of quantum field
theory was mentioned earlier in this book. There are in fact, far deeper
problems than were discussed above, which derive from the well-known
fact that the basic assumptions of QFT are inconsistent. The essence of
the problem is Haag’s theorem, which raises serious questions about the
interaction picture that forms the basis for perturbation theory. Because
there is a direct bearing on the vacuum, it is worth going into the
problem, at least to some extent.
With some simplifications, and simply to emphasize their

reasonableness, the usual postulates of QFT are:
1. The state vectors of the quantum system form a separable,
normalizable Hilbert space with positive definite metric. State
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vectors are related to each other by unitary representations of the

system’s symmetries.
2. The Hilbert space has a vacuum state |0>, which is invariant
under Poincaré and any other symmetry transformations
associated with the system.
3. The fields (x) are “smeared” in the sense that there exists an
operator  f = f x  x dx , whose domain in Hilbert
space is a linear manifold containing the vacuum state. Under a

Poincaré transformation, this linear manifold is mapped onto
itself, and the smeared fields transform covariantly.
4. The field operators at space-like separated points either commute
or anticommute with each other. This is essentially a locality
postulate.
5. The result of applying all polynomials of the smeared fields onto
the vacuum state |0> results in a dense set in the linear manifold
of postulate 3.
If, in addition, we require (a) that the equal time commutation relations
are true for the fields, (b) that these commutation relations do not permit
inequivalent representations, and (c) that asymptotic fields are in the
Hilbert space, then Haag’s theorem states that the resulting field theory is
for non-interacting particles. Or put another way, Haag’s theorem states
that the interaction picture exists only if there is no interaction. There are
various proofs of Haag’s theorem, but except for philosophers of science,
the theorem has generally been ignored after the 1970s.
The way chosen by most theorists out of this conundrum is to allow

inequivalent representations; i.e., give up (b). One then attempts to use
the dynamics of the system to choose one representation from all
possible inequivalent representations. That the different representations
are unitarily inequivalent means that there is no longer, for the theories
associated with each representation, an isomorphism between the states
or the observables of the two theories.
When dealing with inequivalent representations, the assumption of the

uniqueness of the vacuum is only valid in one particular representation.
As a result, giving up (b) leads to a degeneracy of the vacuum. This
results in a theory with a broken symmetry. It is extremely interesting,
especially from the Standard Model point of view, that symmetry
breaking already occurs when choosing the most acceptable way to deal
with Haag’s theorem. We now give a simple example of a symmetry that
does not have a unitary implementation.
Consider the Lagrangian , which is invariant under the global
translation → , where  is a space-time independent

constant. This invariance applies to the Lagrangian but it cannot be
unitarily implemented in the space of states. To show this we will
assume that such a unitary transformation exists and show that this
assumption results in a contradiction. First of all, using the standard
normal mode expansion, we know that <0|(x)|0> = 0. If a unitary
operator did exist for the transformation → one could
write
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 x =  x +   U   x U  
†
where U = exp(iQ) and Q is a Hermitian generator of the

transformation. Q operating on the vacuum state would be expected to
result in the eigenvalue 0, so that<0|U() = <0| and U†() |0> = |0> as
well (expand the exponential). Since <0|(x)|0> = 0, the vacuum
expectation value of (x) would be <0|(x)|0> = . But from the above
equation,
<0|(x)|0> = <0|U() (x) U†()|0> = <0|(x)|0> = 0,
so there are two values for the vacuum expectation of (x), a

contradiction that implies that a unitary operator does not exist. Compare
this with the discussion of spontaneous symmetry breaking in the earlier
part of this book. We see that when the Lagrangian has a symmetry that
cannot be represented in terms of unitary operators on the state space the
symmetry is hidden or spontaneously broken.
The electro-weak and QCD symmetry breakings of the Standard Model

are generally interpreted as phase transitions in the early, expanding
universe that took place after what Fred Hoyle derogatively called “the
big bang”. The evidence for this beginning is the cosmic microwave
radiation (see Appendix D).
As the universe cooled, it presumably passed through some critical

temperatures corresponding to the energy scales of these transitions. The
various parameters at different times are expected to look like:
Time Energy Temp. Diam. of

t E = kT T universe, R
(s) (GeV) (K) (cm)
Planck time, tP1 10–44 1019 1032 10–3
GUT SU (5) breaking, Mx 10–36 1015 1028 10
SU(2)L ⊗ U(1) breaking, Mw 10–10 102 1015 1014

Quark confinement, 10–6 1 1013 1016
pp– annihilation
v decoupling, 1 10–3 1010 1019

e+ e– annihilation
Lighter nuclei form 102 10–4 109 1020
γ decoupling,
transition from radiation 1012 10–9 104 1025
cosmos to matter cosmos, (≈105 y)
atomic nuclei form,
stars and galaxies form
Today, t0 ≈ 5 · 1017 3 · 10–13 3 1028

(≈ 2 · 1010 y)
It was explained above that zero-mass quarks would travel at the speed
of light and their spin could be aligned either along the direction of
motion or opposite to it. This handedness, or chirality, is Lorentz
invariant, and this symmetry is explicitly broken when the quark mass is
not neglected. In the cooling universe scenario, the critical temperature
Tc , corresponding to the chiral and confinement transitions, when quarks
become bound, are thought to be similar. At T > Tc , chiral symmetry is
obeyed, and the vacuum expectation value of the quark-antiquark
condensate, 〈0| |0〉, is zero. As the temperature falls below Tc , chiral
symmetry is spontaneously broken, and the vacuum expectation value of
the condensate becomes nonzero.
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The result of a non-zero vacuum expectation value is that the vacuum

energy density, associated with such condensates, is enormous. Some
estimates from the literature are:
~1046 erg/cm3; ~10 erg/cm3; provided we set V() = 0 for

 = 0, and take the Higgs coupling constant as roughly the square of the
fine structure constant, the Higgs vacuum energy density would be
10 erg/cm3.
If the electroweak and QCD symmetry breakings of the Standard Model

are taken to be phase transitions in the early, expanding universe, then
general relativity must apply. If, further, the vacuum energy densities are
real, they must appear in Einstein’s equations in conjunction with the
consmological constant. For the static Einstein universe, the relation
between the radius of curvature of the universe and the cosmological
constant is
8 G = 12 = ,
a
where  is the mass density of the dust filled universe (with zero
pressure) and a is the radius of curvature For the vacuum energy
densities associated with the electroweak sector or QCD, this equation
tells us that the universe would essentially shrivel to almost nothing, or
as famously attributed to Pauli, the radius of the world "nicht einmal bis
zum Mond reichen würde" [would not even reach to the moon].
Turning to the modern context, we would write an equation relating the

effective cosmological constant to the various vacuum energy densities
as follows:
 eff =  0 + 84G  vac ,

c
where 0 is Einstein’s original cosmological constant, and vac includes

contributions from any zero-point energies, vacuum fluctuations, the
Higgs field, and QCD gluon and quark condensates.
The experimental value for the energy density associated with the
cosmological constant is 10 erg/cm3. The conclusion that
must be drawn from this is that the equation above for eff is wrong; that
is, in terms of gravitation, the various vacuum energy contributions are
effectively zero, either because they represent artifacts of the quantum
theories or because they are cancelled out by some unknown mechanism.
It would be extremely unlikely that the negative vacuum energy
associated with the Higgs, with its arbitrarily chosen zero (V() = 0 for
= 0), along with similar negative contributions, would exactly cancel
out the remaining positive energy contributions.
The evidence given to support the reality of the various contributions to

the vacuum energy is the Casimir effect, which is a consequence of the
lowest order vacuum fluctuations, and higher order effects like the Lamb
shift. But there are alternative explanations. The Casimir effect could
result from fluctuations associated with the constituents of the plates
rather than vacuum fluctuations. Schwinger’s source theory takes this
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point of view and avoids vacuum fluctuations in both the Casimir and
higher order QED effects. As Schwinger put it, “. . . the vacuum is not
only the state of minimum energy, it is the state of zero energy, zero
momentum, zero angular momentum, zero charge, zero whatever.” Pauli
also seemed to agree with this position when commenting on field
fluctuations in quantum field theory, “. . . it is quite impossible to decide
whether the field fluctuations are already present in empty space or only
created by the test bodies.”
The possibility has also been raised that one should allow the vacuum to
have a negative energy spectrum as is done in the Dirac hole theory (of
course, Dirac filled up these states); the idea being that positive vacuum
energy density contributions would be exactly cancelled by
compensating negative energy contributions. Interestingly enough, this
possibility is not seriously considered in the literature despite the fact
that Schwinger long ago showed that if QFT is to be gauge invariant
there is a term (called the Schwinger term) that must vanish. He then
showed that if the term does vanish, the vacuum state couldn’t be the
state with lowest field energy. As put by Schwinger, “. . . it is customary
to assert that the electric charge density of a Dirac field commutes with
the current density at equal times, since the current vector is a gauge-
invariant bilinear combination of the Dirac fields. It follows from the
conservation of charge that the charge density and its time derivative,
referring to any pair of spatial points at a common time, are
commutative. But this is impossible if a lowest energy state — the
vacuum — is to exist.” Since the argument is rather opaque in the 1959
Physical Review Letters article, a derivation is given in Appendix C

below for those readers interested in the details.
It is not my intent to explore any particular solution to this “cosmological

problem”, but rather simply point out that it is a serious issue lying at the
foundation of the various field theories that has not really begun to be
resolved. Both quantum field theory and general relativity have had
spectacular success in explaining the domains of their applicability, but
there is no experimental evidence that there is a close relationship
between the two. All such claims that a relationship exists are based on
theoretical expectations.
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Appendix A: The Particle Enigma
What is a particle? We all know that the concept of a particle comes from
Democritus’ idea of atoms. His conception, and what today we would
call Brownian motion, was related by Lucretius to the origin of all
motion in his poem On the Nature of Things (50 B.C.E.):
Whence Nature all creates, and multiplies

And fosters all, and whither she resolves
Each in the end when each is overthrown.
This ultimate stock we have devised to name
Procreant atoms, matter, seeds of things,
Or primal bodies, as primal to the world.
 
For thou wilt mark here many a speck, impelled
By viewless blows, to change its little course,
And beaten backwards to return again,
Hither and thither in all directions round.
Lo, all their shifting movement is of old,
From the primeval atoms; for the same
Primordial seeds of things first move of self,
And then those bodies built of unions small
And nearest, as it were, unto the powers
Of the primeval atoms, are stirred up
By impulse of those atoms' unseen blows,
And these thereafter goad the next in size;
Thus motion ascends from the primevals on,
And stage by stage emerges to our sense,
Until those objects also move which we
Can mark in sunbeams, though it not appears
What blows do urge them.
83
With a little license, Lucretius’ “Procreant atoms, matter, seeds of

things, Or primal bodies” formed the basis of physical thought until
quite late into modern times. In the ancient world, however, while it was
accepted there might be different kind of atoms, the number of types was
small and sometimes related to geometrical shapes. The advent of
modern chemistry and spectroscopy in the 19th century began the
formation of the current understanding of the nature of atoms.
Today, it is believed that the elementary building blocks of matter are

leptons and quarks, all of which are called fermions and obey the Dirac
equation for a particle of spin of ½. In addition, there is electromagnetic
radiation carrying a spin of 1. Lucretius’ understanding of atoms has
been carried over into the modern conception of “particle” in the sense
that the basic fermions are thought to be “structureless” or “point”
particles. This can be seen in the attempts to construct “classical” models
for the electron. Examples are the de Broglie-Bohm interpretation of
quantum mechanics [1] and the work of David Hestenes. [2] But
retaining the idea of a massive charged point particle requires that both
mass and charge be renormalized, a process that has never rested
comfortably with many physicists.
The greatest challenge to the ancient idea of a particle came from the
work of de Broglie, who introduced in 1924 the idea that each particle
had associated with it an internal clock of frequency m0c2/h. From this
idea he found his famous relation showing particles of matter were
associated with a wave. [3] He did not believe a particle like the electron
was a point particle, but rather that the energy of an electron was spread
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out over all space with a strong concentration in a very small region:
“L’électron est pour nous le type du morceau isolé d’énergie, celui que
nous croyons, peut-être à tort, le mieux connaître; or, d’après les
conceptions reçues, l’énergie de l’électron est répandue dans tout
l’espace avec une très forte condensation dans une région de très petites
dimensions dont les propriétés nous sont d’ailleurs fort mal connues.” [4]
A1. The de Broglie Relation: Theory and Experiment
De Broglie, in his 1929 Nobel lecture used the following argument:
p =  m 0v =  m 0c 2 v = E v .
c2 c2
Identifying the energy of the massive particle with E = h gives
p = h
c 2 /v .
De Broglie then assumed that c 2 / v corresponds to a phase velocity

2
via vV = c , so that
hv h
p= = .
V V /v
Using V = v , he obtains his relation  p = h.

2
Note that by assuming that c / v corresponds to a phase velocity de
Broglie is introducing waves having neighboring frequencies so that he
can define both phase and group velocities. The phase velocity so
introduced is, in Max Born’s words, “a purely artificial conception,
inasmuch as it cannot be determined experimentally.” [5]
The existence of de Broglie’s internal clock has recently been directly

subject to experiment. The experimental approach used is known as
“electron channeling”, a phenomenon observed in silicon crystals. [6],
[7] In the experiments, a stream of electrons is aligned along a major axis
of a thin single crystal corresponding to a row of atoms. The
transmission probability along this axis, compared to neighboring angles
with respect to the axis, is reduced except for a sharp peak in the
direction of the axis. This peak or resonance occurs at a momentum of
~80MeV/c as can be seen in Fig. A1.1 [8]. The electrons responsible for
this resonance move along the cylindrical potential of one row of atoms
in precessing orbits known as Sommerfeld rosettes — they are captured
in a bound state of the row’s potential. The position of this resonance
corresponds to the de Broglie frequency.
While the experimental data show a resonance at a momentum of

~80MeV/c, modeling scattering calculations predict a resonance at
~161MeV/c. The discrepancy between the model results and the
experimental results have not been completely resolved as of this
writing.
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What is clear, however, is that the electron momentum of ~80MeV/c

corresponds to a momentum of 2.7  1022 kg m/s, and using the
relativistic expression for the energy, , this

corresponds to an energy of 1.2  1011j. This allows the calculation of
the de Broglie wavelength to be deB = 1.6  1014 m, corresponding to a
frequency of deB = 1.8  10. Note that in the rest frame of the moving
electron, these values must be compensated for the relativistic motion

using  = 156.5 giving deB = 2.5  1012 m and deB = 1.15  10, the
usual values for deB and deB in the rest frame. The atomic spacing in the
crystal lattice is d = 3.8  1010 m, significantly larger than the de Broglie
wavelength.
counts
3000
2000
1000
0
–10 –5 0 5 10 mrad
Figure A1.1. Experimental data from electrons of momentum 80

MeV/c aligned along the <110> direction of a 1 m thick silicon
crystal. The figure shows counting rate vs. crystal tilt angle. The
full curve is the product of a phenomenological calculation.
[Adapted from P. Catillon, et al. Found Phys 38, 659-664 (2008)].
Addendum 1 has a discussion of the theory behind the channeling

resonance phenomena given by Bauer. [9]
A2. The Zig-Zag Picture of the Electron
Penrose has introduced another conception of particles satisfying the

Dirac equation and specifically applied it to the electron — he calls it
“The zigzag picture of the electron”. [10] He continues, however, to view
fermions like the electron as point particles.
Penrose’s idea is related to the concept of zitterbewegung, which is

generally associated with a point particle showing that the minimum
effective size of the particle is its Compton radius. While the
conventional phenomenon of zitterbewegung has been covered in many
textbooks, it may be useful to have a presentation on it here. Addendum
2 covers this as well as the equivalent for electromagnetic radiation, a
phenomenon that is not so well known.
The electroweak interactions inform us that the fundamental constituents

of matter are leptons and quarks. These irreducible building blocks of
spin ½ fermions are fields that transform under the left and right handed
(or spinor) representations of the Lorentz group designated by (½, 0) or
(0, ½ ) respectively. Thus a Dirac fermion field combines two equal mass
2-component fields into the group , which is a
reducible representation of the Lorentz group. [11]
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The Dirac 4-spinor can then be represented as a pair of 2-spinors (call
them ϕL and ϕR) and the Dirac equation becomes an equation coupling
these two spinors with the coupling constant being related to the mass of
the particle. These equations can be written
(A2.1)
where the 4-vector pμ = (E, p), pμ = (E, p), and the signature is 2. The
quantity ∙ /| | ∙ is the component of spin in the direction of the
momentum and is the helicity. When the mass vanishes, helicity is the
same as chirality where one also speaks of left and right chirality, but this
can be quite misleading especially when the mass is not zero. In that case
chirality is a purely quantum mechanical quantity related to the weak
interactions, which do not exhibit mirror reflection symmetry.
Penrose calls these 2-spinors “zig” and “zag” particles, which he

assumes to be massless. He furthermore assumes that these particles are
continuously converting themselves into each other at a frequency
related to the zitterbewegung frequency, which he observes is
“essentially the de Broglie frequency”. There is a problem with this in
that the de Broglie and zitterbewegung frequencies differ by a factor of
two. There is also the additional problem that chiral oscillations vanish
for massless particles (see discussion just above Eq. (A2.5) below).
Penrose is obviously aware of this when he states that for these massless
particles, “Each is the source for the other, with the rest-mass as coupling
constant”.
The left-handed massless zig particle is defined by Penrose as that part of

the Dirac field projected out by the operator (½)(15 having helicity
1/2and the right-handed zag particle as that projected by (½)(15
having helicity ½. In the rest frame of the electron the zigzag oscillation
is at the speed of light with the direction of spin remaining constant. It is
important to keep in mind that for mass-zero particles helicity is the same
as chirality and these projection operators are really the chirality
operators.
The zigzag oscillation is a chiral oscillation. The way to see this is by

decomposing the Dirac wave function as
(A2.2)
The symmetries can be found by use of the Lagrangian
L
(A2.3)
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Here, is the Dirac adjoint defined as , and

. Note that the kinetic energy connects L to L and R to R,
while the mass terms connect L to R and R to L.
For , leaves this Lagrangian invariant so that

and . The current associated with this
symmetry is .
For m = 0, one has chiral symmetry where . The axial current

is conserved, but now and .
Note the difference in sign in the exponent indicating that the phase
direction of rotation in the complex plane is opposite, and that the
difference in direction corresponds to complex conjugation. What this is
saying is that when one rotates a fermion, its wave function is shifted in
phase in a direction that depends on the fermion’s chirality. This can be
seen in Fig. A2.1.
The last term in the Lagrangian of Eq. (A2.3) must describe how the
leptons interact with the scalar Higgs field so as to make them massive.
There is no theory governing this process so the form of the interaction is
put in by hand. It comes from introducing a Yukawa like coupling of the
scalars to leptons and further assumes that the Higgs field is a weak
isotopic-spin doublet. The resulting interaction Lagrangian for the
electron is
L , (A2.4)
where Ge is an unknown coupling constant and  is a scalar Higgs field.

The form of this interaction Lagrangian was chosen to guarantee that it
would be symmetric under and transform appropriately
under Lorentz transformations. This form of interaction Hamiltonian will
also maintain the zero mass of the photon and neutrino.
ψR e iθ ψR
φ 1
–φ
ψL e–iφ ψ L
(a)
φ=0
ψL
(small –φ) ψR
(small +φ)
(b)
Figure A2.1. (a) When one rotates a chiral fermion about its
direction of motion, both the left and right chiral fermions change
by a factor of 1, but along opposite paths in the complex plane;
(b) the phase shift of the particle’s wave function depends on it
chirality.
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Chirality and Chiral Oscillation
For convenience, the terms “particle” and “antiparticle” — which usually

apply to a point particle — will be freely used in this section since no
acceptable alternatives are readily available. These “particles” should
nevertheless not be thought of as point particles. An alternative
interpretation of what they might be will be given in Section 3. The
electron will be used as an example and ϕL and ϕR will be designated as
and .
When m = 0, the Dirac spinors for the electron and the positron become
linearly dependent so that they form a 2-dimensional vector space rather
than a 4-dimensional space. The meaning of and corresponding
respectively to the massive electron and positron, changes in a rather
complicated way: [12] describes both a left-handed particle and a
right handed-antiparticle and describes both a right-handed particle
and a left-handed antiparticle. The massive particle that propagates
through space is a quantum mechanical mixture of these particles and
antiparticles and the mixture gains mass via interaction with the Higgs
boson. This is shown in graphic form in Fig. A2.2. In the usual scenario
of a cooling early universe, these particles remain massless until
electroweak symmetry breaking and interaction with the Higgs boson.
The Higgs field then takes a constant value everywhere.
Figure A2.2. The W or Z bosons that mediate the weak force only interact
with left-chiral electrons, , and the right-chiral positrons, . They,
like the other particles shown in the figure, except for and are
massless. The massive particles and are a quantum mechanical
mixture of the pairs shown and appear when the mixture interacts with the
Higgs non-zero vacuum expectation value. The Higgs induced mass term
connects the massless left-chiral electron to the right-chiral electron
and the left-chiral positron to the right-chiral positron. The right-chiral
electron is designated by , and the left-chiral positron by . The W
and Z are also massless before electroweak symmetry breaking.
It will be remembered that the eigenvalues of the velocity operator α in

the Dirac equation are ±c. For m = 0, the massless particles
corresponding to and propagate at the velocity of light, but after
electroweak symmetry breaking the physical electron or positron gains
mass via the Higgs mechanism and travels at a velocity that is always
less than that of light. The combinations of these massless particles that
make up the massive particles after interaction with the non-zero vacuum
expectation value of the Higgs are also shown in Fig. A2.2. The W or Z
bosons that mediate the weak force will only interact with left-chiral
electrons and right-chiral positrons and do not interact with right-chiral
electrons or left-chiral positrons. This is a consequence of the non-
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invariance of the weak interactions under mirror reflection symmetry

induced by the parity or P operator.
Ordinarily, the weak interactions are invariant under the combination of

charge conjugation and parity (CP), one exception being the decay of the
K0 meson. [13] In Fig. A2.2, the combination of CP would convert
to .
The left-chiral electrons, , and the right-chiral positrons, , could

not mix to form the physical electron because they have different
charges. On the other hand, the left-chiral electrons, , carry a weak
charge, but the right-chiral electrons, , do not. One might think the
interaction between them would be forbidden by gauge invariance. This
is not the case because of the non-zero vacuum expectation value of the
Higgs boson (which itself carries a weak charge). It is this non-zero
expectation value that breaks the conservation of weak charge and allows
the mixing.
Chiral Oscillations and Frequency
In this section, the conventions and notation of De Leo and Rotelli [14]
will generally be used. The chiral operator 5 does not commute with
Dirac free-particle Hamiltonian ∙ since 0 =  and

[0, 5] = 205. Using the average value of the time derivative of an
operator in the Heisenberg representation, the time derivative of the
chiral operator is 〈 〉 〈 , 〉 2 〈 〉. Note that 〈 〉
0 if m = 0. Now,
(A2.5)
where is the Dirac adjoint so that

is an invariant quantity.
If and the Dirac spinors are normalized as
(A2.6)
(x) can be expanded in terms of plane waves as
(A2.7)
Note that the time dependence is contained in ikx since k and x are 4-
vectors. The coefficients a(k) and b(k) must satisfy
(A2.8)
The evaluation of Eq. (A2.5) is tedious, and results in
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(A2.9)
where , and h.c. stands for “hermitian conjugate”. All that is

really needed to illustrate the chiral oscillation are the cross terms given
by . It can be shown that this term results in the non-zero
quantity
(A2.10)
This non-zero term shows that the chiral oscillation does not vanish and
can be seen from Eq. (A2.9) to have the frequency 2 / , which is
identical to the zitterbewegung frequency. As is the case for the
zitterbewegung, for composed of only positive or negative
frequencies, .
The chiral representation has been used above. Switching now to the
standard representation for the Dirac matrices (following De Leo and
Rotelli), one can show that so that Eq. (A2.10)
[using the normalization given in Eqs. (A2.6)] becomes
(A2.11)
Now, the time derivative of the chiral operator was shown above to be
〈 〉 〈 〉 and 〈 0 5〉
2 was given in Eq. (A2.9). One can then
write 〈 〉 as
(A2.12)
If this is now integrated between 0 and t, the result is
(A2.13)
Let us return now to Penrose’s zig-zag interpretation of the fundamental

particles of matter (the leptons and quarks), fermions having a spin of ½.
While very attractive, the zig-zag model still has at its heart the concept
of the point particle. An alternative will be given in the section below
titled A Topological Alternative for Charge.
As observed by Halzen et al. [15], “. . . the same Higgs doublet that

generates the and Z masses is also sufficient to give masses to the
leptons and quarks”. When the Higgs field has a non-zero expectation
value it breaks the conservation of weak charge and allows and
of Fig. A2.2 to mix so as to form the physical electron. Because the
Higgs field can interact with both the and it forces them to
change back and forth into each other in the chiral oscillation discussed
earlier. During this oscillation, and lose their independent
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identity and are transformed into a single massive elementary particle.

The same is true for the massless and that through interaction
with the Higgs becomes the massive positron.
In the section on photon zitterbewegung in Addendum 2, it is shown that

even a non-localizable “particle” like the photon can exhibit this
behavior, which is usually only associated with what historically has
been called a point particle. The photon can, however, be localized for a
brief moment by an interaction to about its “Compton radius”, which
corresponds to its classical wavelength; i.e., by assuming E = h and m =
E/c2, one has c-ph = h/mc = hc/E = c/.
The frequency of the zitterbewegung associated with the position

operator for the electron is identical with that of the chiral oscillation
related to 5. Both oscillations vanish if only positive or negative
frequency solutions to the Dirac equation are used. This strongly
suggests that zitterbewegung and chiral oscillations are intimately related
despite their very different interpretations.
In the zig-zag concept of the electron, and continually convert

themselves into the other due to their interaction with the Higgs at the
chiral oscillation frequency ch , which is the same as the zitterbewegung
frequency. This means the mass m in Eq. (A2.1), which serves as a
coupling constant between these two equations, is being interpreted as a
field, to quote Penrose, “essentially the Higgs field”; an illustration of
this idea is shown in Fig. A2.3.
Being massless particles, the wavefunction for and after a

localizing interaction expands at the velocity of light until the next
localizing interaction with the Higgs. This corresponds to a distance
c/ch = ~ 1.3  1012 m, the Compton wavelength of the electron.
Another way of looking at this is to realize that the exact time of the
interaction with the Higgs is associated with a time uncertainty of t and
since mass before the interaction is zero and after is m0c2, the uncertainty
relation tells us that , again the
Compton wavelength. This is also shown in Fig. A2.3.
eR

eL
Higgs
  }t
eR Interaction
| | x = c

eL
{ eLand eR } { eLand eR }
(a) (b)
Figure A2.3. (a) and on their own are massless, but the
quantum mechanical mixture acquires mass through interaction
with the non-zero vacuum expectation value of the Higgs.
(b) at each interaction with the Higgs field, there is an uncertainty
t in the time of interaction leading to a spatial uncertainty of
x = c.
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In the Penrose model, the particles and obey the Dirac equation
for a particle of mass m, written in the chiral form [Eqs. (A2.1)] as,
Between Higgs interactions, the massless particles and obey the

same equations with m equal to zero. In Fig. A2.3(a), starting with at
the bottom, the first Higgs interaction destroys the left-handed massless
particle and creates the right-handed antiparticle ( is the right
handed antiparticle of ). The second interaction with the Higgs field
destroys the right-handed massless antiparticle and creates the left-
handed massless particle . It is this oscillation that is the source of the
mass through the relation E = h; i.e., m = (1/2c2) hch.
A3. Beyond Democritus
Interpreting the absolute value of the wave function in quantum

mechanics as the probability of interacting with a fundamental “particle”
such as an electron at a given location does not mandate that the electron
is a point particle. As put by Max Born who gave us this interpretation,
“. . . we are not justified in concluding that the ‘thing’ under examination
can actually be described as a particle in the usual sense of the term. . . .
The ultimate origin of the difficulty lies in the fact (or philosophical
principle) that we are compelled to use the words of common language
when we wish to describe a phenomenon, not by logical or mathematical
analysis, but by a picture appealing to the imagination.” [16]
The Dirac or Schrödinger equations do not require that their wave

functions describe the motion of a point particle. What the mathematics
of quantum mechanics tells us is that an “elementary particle” is not a
“particle” in the sense of classical physics. The advent of quantum
mechanics mandated that the classical notion of a particle be given up.
But rather than accept this, there were many attempts in the 20th century
to retain the idea of a classical particle by a mix of classical and quantum
mechanical concepts. Perhaps the best was David Bohm’s 1952 theory
that introduced the idea of a “quantum potential”, which was later show
to be equivalent to the usual quantum mechanics. None of these were
really successful. In the end, we must live with the fact that an
elementary particle is some form of space-time excitation that can be
localized through interactions and even when not localized obeys all the
relevant conservation rules and retains the “particle” properties like
mass, spin, and charge.
This should not be terribly surprising since Newton-Wigner [17] and

Pryce [18] showed (see discussion in Addendum 2) that a particle with
spin cannot be localized to better than its Compton radius. Yet, quantum
electrodynamics assumes that the electron is a point particle and
electron-positron colliding beam experiments show this holds down
to distances less than 1018 m. Even though this is the case, it is
straightforward to show that the electric charge of an electron cannot be a

classical charge distribution of this or similar size that interacts with
itself. If it were, its classical self-energy would exceed the rest mass
energy of the electron. Another example of how classical concepts
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should not be carried over into quantum mechanics. Quantum

electrodynamics also tells us that the effective charge of a point particle
is spread out over a distance on the order of the Compton radius. This is
apparent when the phenomenon of vacuum polarization is taken into
account during charge renormalization.
Modern physics is telling us that space-time can support a variety of

excitations that make up the various “particles” of matter whether short
lived or stable. The basic building blocks are the leptons and quarks, all
of which are fermions obeying the Dirac equation for spin ½. All are
associated with chiral oscillations and become massive by interaction
with the spatially isotropic non-vanishing Higgs vacuum expectation
value. In the Penrose model, these oscillations are continually localized
by interactions with the Higgs field, and none of them need be or should
be thought of as point particles. For the electron, the minimum
localization is the Compton wavelength, but determining the minimum
localization for quarks is more complicated than simply using the
formula for the Compton wavelength because of the quark’s color
interactions. Estimates for the radius of the “dressed quark” divided by
the radius of the proton are in the range of 0.2 to 0.5.
Perhaps the most counter-intuitive part of replacing the classical idea of a

particle is accepting that a space-time excitation corresponding to a
stable particle can itself carry charge, spin, angular momentum, and
mass. But that is what the mathematics and physics is telling us. Such an
excitation, say for an electron, is continually localized to its Compton
wavelength as in Fig. A2.3, which gives it its particle aspects. It can
carry spin angular momentum without being a classical particle, as does

the photon. But it is perhaps charge that is the most difficult to
understand.
A Topological Alternative for Charge
Over sixty years ago Wheeler formulated a classical explanation for

charge based on electric flux threading a general relativistic “wormhole”,
which would doubly connect spacetime — what he called “charge
without charge”. [19] Einstein’s field equations allow such wormholes.
The concept is illustrated in Fig. A3.1.
Figure A3.1. Wheeler’s “charge without charge” concept where

3-dimensional space is represented as a 2-dimensional
hypersurface with a wormhole. The dimension off the surface has
no physical meaning. The lines threading the wormhole are the
electric field lines. [Adapted from J.A. Wheeler, Phys. Rev. 97,
511 (1955)]
A modern version of this idea comes from string theory [20] where a
string, whose length is generally thought to be comparable to the Planck
length ~1035m, terminates on a D-brane (defined below). The lowest
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vibrational modes of such strings are used to represent the fundamental

particles of the standard model. In fundamental string theory, the strings
are generally taken to be infinitely thin, although this need not be the
case. The string’s charge density, because of its vectorial nature, is often
interpreted as a current flowing in the string, which on the brane itself is
carried by the electric field. This possibility is very attractive and a basic
introduction to string theory with a possible extension will be given here.
The general term “D-brane” refers to an “object” upon which, for our
purposes, string endpoints lie. The letter D stands for the Dirichlet
boundry conditions the endpoint must satisfy on the brane. A Dp-brane is
an object with p spatial dimensions. The general spacetime dimension is
p + 1. So 4-dimensional spacetime is considered to be a D3-brane. An
example of a D2-brane with a string having endpoints on the brane is
shown in Fig. 3.2. The string is drawn so as to be orthogonal to the
brane. Branes with D spatial dimensions are also called D-branes. D-
branes are not necessarily hypersurfaces or of infinite extent, they can
also be finite, closed surfaces. The additional spatial dimensions beyond
the dimension of the brane are said to comprise the “bulk”.
It should be mentioned that for representing particles that are fermions,

one must introduce “superstrings”. The “world-sheet” of an open string
is defined as the trajectory of the string in space-time with space-like
coordinates . On this world sheet there are two linearly independent
tangent vectors given by and , where  parameterizes time and
 parameterizes the distance along the string. For bosonic strings, one
uses the classical variable , to describe the position of the string.
For superstrings, the classical anti-commuting variables , ,
(), are used. Their quantization results in particle states that

represent spacetime fermions. This is one of the reasons that
supersymmetry is so attractive; the principal other one being that its
confirmation would allow the strengths of the strong, weak, and
electromagnetic forces to merge at ~1015 GeV.
To see how string theory might offer a modern incarnation of Wheeler’s

“charge without charge” we need to introduce the Kalb-Ramond
massless antisymmetric gauge field B = B , which is the analog of
the Maxwell gauge field A of electromagnetics.
In the case of electromagnetics, the field strength is given by

. For B the field strength, , is defined as
. It is generally thought that the
endpoints of the string shown in Fig. A3.2 have a Maxwell electric
charge.
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X1
X2 D2
Figure A3.2. The D2-brane extends over the (x1, x2)-plane. The
endpoints of the string are free to move over the plane. The
Dirichlet boundary condition for the string is that the endpoint of
the string cannot move out of the plane. The dimension on the
unmarked axis outside the plane should not be thought of as a
third spatial dimension belonging to the D2-brane.
The string, on the other hand, carries electric Kalb-Ramond charge. This
charge can be viewed as a “current” flowing along the string; the string
charge density vector is tangent to the string. The action for the brane
and the string will have a term. Since couples to it
must carry a string charge, but , so that the Maxwell electric
field on the brane carries string charge.
As mentioned before, it has been assumed here that the string is

orthogonal to the brane. This is because for a string ending on a
Dp-brane, where , the velocity can be freely chosen if the string is
orthogonal to the brane, whereas if it is not it must move at the velocity
of light transverse to the string. A good discussion of boundary
conditions and the history of the discovery of branes has been given by
Tong. [21]
To summarize the overall picture given thus far, the ends of the string in
Fig. A3.2 or Fig. A3.3 behave as point charges in Maxwell
electromagnetics; the electric field in, for example, a D3-brane also carry
string charge. The string charge on the string is a vector quantity and is
analogous to a Maxwell current along the string. This is shown in
Fig. A3.3 with one spatial dimension suppressed. That the endpoints of
the string correspond to point particles is consistent with the
experimental observation, using electron-positron colliding beams, that
the electron appears as a point particle down to distances less than
1018 m.
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x1
–
Electric Kalb-Raymond string
charge density vector j 0 analogous
to a Maxwell current.
x2
D3-Brane
Figure A3.3. A string beginning and ending on a D3-Brane. The

ends of the string behave as Maxwell point charges; the electric
field lines in the D3-brane also carry string charge. The Kalb-
Raymond string charge density is analogous to a Maxwell current
along the string.
The following discussion explains how a Maxwell charge arises when

strings terminate on branes. It comes from the fact that the conservation
of string charge fails at the string endpoints. The way string theory solves
this issue is to add to the string action two terms that couple the Maxwell
gauge field A to the Kalb-Ramond gauge field B . This is done so as
to preserve gauge invariance.
The field strength, , defined above, is totally antisymmetric and

invariant under the gauge transformations
(A3.1)
Here the arguments of B are the string coordinates X( , ).
The part of the action that couples the string to the B field is given by
(A3.2)
is totally antisymmetric so that when this action is varied using

Eq. (A3.1) the result is
(A3.3)
The second equality is a result of not being a function of  and

not being a function of .
Now if  is set equal to zero at , the term vanishes. Since the

string terminates on a D-brane, the coordinates may be divided into
m
those on the brane labeled X and those perpendicular to the brane
a
labeled X . Then integrating Eq. (A3.3) on the brane with respect to 
gives
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(A3.4)
Because Dirichlet boundary conditions apply at both end points of the

string, the term Λ vanishes when evaluated at these points.
For SB to be gauge invariant SB must vanish. To make this happen one
adds a term to the action coupling the ends of the string to the Maxwell
fields on the brane. That is,
(A3.5)
For this to work, one must impose the condition Am = m. Doing so
immediately results in S = 0 so that gauge invariance is restored. Now,
however, since Fmn = Bmn neither field is independently gauge
invariant. This means that the physical field strength must be redefined
as Fmn = Fmn + Bmn. Then on the brane the gauge invariant generalization
of the Maxwell Lagrangian density is . Expanding this
gives
(A3.6)
The last term can be written as
(A3.7)
Since couples to it must carry a string charge, but so

that Maxwell electric field on the brane carries string charge.
The real question is how to interpret the second term of Eq. (A3.5),
(A3.8)
It is generally maintained that these terms add a plus and minus Maxwell
charge to the ends of the string. But the first term on the right hand side
of Eq. (A3.7) can be interpreted as saying that not only does the Maxwell
electric field on the brane carry string charge, but the string in the “bulk”
carries the electric field as well. This is what the F0kB0k term in
Eq. (A3.7) means — the two fields are coupled. If this is the case, there
need be no charge at the terminations of the string on the brane but just
the emergence of the field lines, which would look like charges within
the brane; essentially as shown in Fig. A3.3 with the + and – symbols
corresponding to the entering and leaving of the field lines in the brane
rather than charges. Gauge invariance is conserved since there is no
longer a boundary for  and the term in Eq. (A3.3) vanishes.
Using two parallel branes one can give a modern version of Wheeler’s
“charge without charge”. The use of two is important for if only one
were used (as in Fig. A3.3) with a string having both ends attached to it
to represent particles with opposite charge, the motion of the charges
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could possibly affect string tension and hence mass. With two branes
having constant separation the motion of the particles need not affect the
string tension provided the motions of the string ends on each brane
mirror each other. The configuration is shown in Fig. A3.4.
Brane 2
– +
+ –
Brane 1
Figure A3.4. Two-brane version of Wheeler’s “charge without charge”.

The dashed lines correspond to strings that carry both the Electric Kalb-
Raymond string charge density vector and the Maxwell electric field.
The same is true of the Maxwell field lines within the two branes as
suggested by the coupling . The dots at the end of the strings
indicate where the fields enter (+) or leave () the branes — not actual
charges. The strings move in tandem with the oppositely “charged” string
ends and the spacing between the branes does not change during the
motion so as to keep the mass associated with the string ends constant.
Motion of a string end in brane 1 is mirrored by motion of the oppositely
charged string end in brane 2.
There is no necessity to associate charges with the string ends since

neither the Kalb-Raymond string charge density vector or Maxwell
electric field terminates there. But it remains to discuss the nature of the
string itself.
The trajectory of a zero-dimensional point particle is a one-dimensional

curve. In string theory a string is often taken to be the same thing — a
one-dimensional space. Since the lowest vibrational modes of such
strings are used to represent the fundamental particles of the standard
model, if the string terminates on a brane, the oscillations within the
brane of the string endpoint could be identified with the zitterbewegung
of the particle. So long as the string diameter is zero, the oscillations of
the end point would be equivalent to the oscillations of a point particle.
There is then an equivalency between the concept of a point particle and
a string with zero thickness.
Tong [21] considers the magnetic flux tubes in Type II superconductors

and the chromo-electric flux tubes in QCD to be strings and notes that
there are two length scales associated with the string, the tension and the
width of the string, where the tension is the energy per unit length of the
string.
If the string were allowed to have a finite diameter when it terminates on

a brane, the endpoint of the string would not correspond to a point
particle. For an electron, the diameter would be similar to the Compton
wavelength, although the field could be localized to far smaller distances.
Since in the model of Fig. A3.4 the string carries the Maxwell electric
field as well as the Kalb-Raymond string charge density, allowing the
string to have a finite diameter limits the strength or magnitude of the
Maxwell electric field in the string (intuitively, the electric field strength
is proportional to the number of “field lines” divided by the area
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perpendicular to the field lines). From the point of view of an observer in

either of the branes, the situation looks like that shown in Fig. A3.1.
An ordinary string has transverse oscillations that propagate at a velocity

of / , where T is the tension and  is the linear mass density.
Consider again the electron. If the Compton wavelength sets the scale,
because the tension is given by the energy per unit length one has
/ / . Substituting this into the expression for the velocity
yields v = c. This is consistent with the string oscillations being identified
with the zitterbewegung and with the eigenvalues of the Dirac velocity
operator being (see Addendum 2 on zitterbewegung). In this case,
the distance between the branes in Fig. A3.4 would be the Compton
wavelength h/mec.
The string theory representation of the particles of the standard model of

particle physics introduces additional complications. In order to
accommodate the elementary fermionic building blocks of leptons and
quarks, three parallel branes that carry color (red, blue, green) are
introduced as well additional branes corresponding to isospin and
chirality. The three color branes correspond to SU(3)C. Quarks are then
open strings with one endpoint on one of these branes. Gluons have both
ends terminating on one of these branes. Antiquarks correspond to
oppositely oriented strings. The other ends of such open strings terminate
on branes having the appropriate isospin and chirality. The fermions in
the standard model require the specification of color, isospin, and
hypercharge.
Red
Blue Color Branes
Red Green
Blue
Green
...
}
}
Leptonic Branes
G, B, R G, B, R
quarks anti-quarks
Left Branes Right Branes
(Left Chiral) (Right Chiral)
(a) (b)
Figure A3.5. (a) Open strings with one end on the brane. The ones
on the left directed toward the brane correspond to green, blue,
and red quarks; those on the right directed away from the brane
are the corresponding anti-quarks. (b) some of the branes of the
standard model. The various particles appear at the crossings. For
zero-mass particles the parallel branes are coincident.
If strings stretch between parallel but not coincident branes their

quantum fluctuations give rise to massive particles with a mass
proportional to their separation because of string tension. If they are
coincident the fluctuations are massless. It should be remembered that in
the standard model masses are not allowed for chiral fermions before
symmetry breaking. The zero mass requirement can be accommodated
by having the color branes intersect the branes corresponding to different
chirality and isospin. Then the fermion fields will be represented by
strings localized to the intersections. The branes that intersect the color
branes are known as left and right branes, which correspond to the left and
right handed particles. The various sets of branes are then color branes,
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left and right branes (sometimes called the weak branes), and leptonic
branes.
All of this adds up to a graphical representation of the standard model in

terms of branes. Some of the way this looks is shown in Fig. A3.5. When
the branes are coincident their fluctuations are massless and mix to form
a matrix valued field.
All of this adds up to a graphical representation of the standard model in

terms of branes. Some of the way this looks is shown in Fig. A3.5.
When the branes are coincident their fluctuations are massless and mix to
form a matrix valued field.
To go beyond this point, the reader is referred to the standard texts on

string theory.
Summary
The concept of the charged point particle already had serious problems in
classical physics and the earlier parts of this book should have made it
clear that the same thing is true in quantum mechanics. All indications
are that the concept of a point particle loses its meaning as one
approaches the Compton wavelength — notwithstanding the fact that
“point particles” can be localized to less than this by high energy
scattering experiments.
Wheeler’s attempt to introduce the concept of “charge without charge” in

the mid-1950s failed primarily because general relativity could not be
quantized, which — despite enormous effort since then — remains true
today. The advent of string theory may offer an alternative to the point
particle despite the fact that there is no experimental evidence that string
theory is more than a fascinating and beautiful mathematical exercise.
The conception of introducing additional space-like dimensions to four-

dimensional spacetime coupled with the concept of strings that could
exist in this enlarged space introduces the possibility of a new
formulation of Wheeler’s “charge without charge”. To do so one must
allow strings to have a width comparable to the Compton wavelength
and allow them to carry an electric field just as an electric field can carry
string charge. This is strongly implied by the coupling term in
Eq. (A3.7).
Addendum 1: Electron Channeling Resonance in Crystals
Consider a line of atoms, corresponding to those of a silicon crystal

along the <110> direction, having a spacing d. Electrons traveling
parallel to this line of atoms are assumed to carrying an internal clock
having a frequency corresponding to the de Broglie frequency. Call the
time measured by this clock T, while that in the laboratory is designated
by t. The de Broglie frequency is and  changes by 2
radians in one cycle. As the electron moves along its path, the phase
velocity represents the change in with respect to T; that is,
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(Ad 1.1)
Then, d / v ph  T . The phase angle change as the electron moves from
one atom to the next is
(Ad 1.2)
Solving for T,
(Ad 1.3)
Now set  =nnote that odd n only changes the sign),
(Ad 1.4)
This is n/2 times the de Broglie period. From T  d / v ph ,
 n  m0 c 2 
 v ph n  d  2  h . (Ad1.5)
c 2 m0 c 2 E
Now v ph vg  c 2 so that v ph    and
vg m0 vg p
En v 
 p  ph  . (Ad 1.6)
c  c 
As will be shown shortly, vg = (11/158) so that there is little error in
replacing p  m0 vg with m0 c . Also,  ~ 1 so that there is no need to
make a relativistic correction. Thus,
En  v 1
 m0 c 2  ph  . (Ad 1.7)
c  c c
As mentioned earlier, for silicon along the <110> direction,
d  3.84  10 10 m . Substituting this and the numerical values for the
other symbols in Eq. (Ad 1.5), and using the result in Eq. (Ad 1.7), gives
En  2  1
   m0 c 2 158 . (Ad 1.8)
c n c
If the units of energy are now chosen to be MeV, the final result for the
momentum is
En  2  1 2
   0.51158    80.58Mev / c . (Ad 1.9)
c n c n
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The data shown in Fig. A1.1 imply that n = 2. One can obtain the
zitterbewegung frequency rather than the de Broglie frequency by using
d/2 rather than d in the expressions above or by assuming
n = 1, but at this point there is no strong experimental reason for doing
either.
So regardless of whatever discrepancies may exist between modeling

results and the experimental data, there would appear to be good reason
to believe de Broglie’s supposition that each particle carries with it a
kind of “internal clock”, which had previously been verified only
indirectly by the many successfully tested implications of the de Broglie
relation.
Addendum 2: Zitterbewegung
The first part of this section discusses the zitterbewegung of particles

obeying the Dirac equation, and the second part shows that the photon
also exhibits zitterbewegung. The purpose of showing that this is the case
is to disassociate zitterbewegung from the conception of a point particle
and show that it is even exhibited by the familiar electromagnetic wave.
With c = 1, the Dirac Hamiltonian is ∙ , where is the

 1 0 
velocity / and  is four by four matrix    .
 0 1 
In the Heisenberg representation, the time derivative of an operator is

dO O
given by  i  H,O  , so that for the position operator ,
dt dt
. (Ad 2.1)
Since only acts on spin variables, this defines each component of as

a constant matrix. The time derivative of is
. (Ad 2.2)
Now if one expands the first term on the r.h.s. of the latter equation in
terms of , , and , , , the result is
(Ad 2.3)
One can solve this equation for by integrating from 0 to t and,

remembering that / , integrate again between the same limits to
obtain the solution for , yielding
. (Ad 2.4)
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2
The term corresponds to a circular motion since it can be written
2
as cos 2 sin2 . At rest, H = mc2 and writing as , and
putting in the , which has been set equal to unity in this calculation,
gives 2 / . This is the frequency of the zitterbewegung.
The classical law for uniform rectilinear motion is given by the first two
terms on the right hand side when they are not operators. It is the last
term that is responsible for the zitterbewegung, and it is usually
interpreted as meaning that the particle samples a region on the order of
its Compton wavelength, / , about the point . Zitterbewegung
is generally thought to be due to interference between negative and
positive frequency states, as was originally proposed by Schrödinger.
It is at this point that the interpretation of fermions, such as electrons and

quarks, as point particles runs into serious problems. This comes about
by calculating the velocity eigenvalues of the velocity operator .
Putting back the constant factors of c in the Dirac equation one gets
. Using the explicit matrices for the  matrices, one
obtains for the eigenvalues . This is usually interpreted to mean that
while the average velocity of the particle may be less than c, the
instantaneous velocity is always , but the meaning of this, given that
the particles are massive and charged, is far from clear.
In a paper more than fifty years ago, Huang [22] used the expectation
values of and in a wave packet representing the electron to

show that the zitterbewegung could be interpreted as a circular motion

about the direction of the electron spin. The radius of the motion was
/2 , the Compton wavelength divided by 2. The intrinsic spin was
then the “orbital angular momentum” of this motion, and the current
produced gives rise to the intrinsic magnetic moment. This is derived
from Dirac theory and is not a classical interpretation of the results.
However, implicit in his discussion is the assumption that the electron is
a point particle. This is also an assumption made by many others who
have attempted to formulate classical models of fermions based on the
zitterbewegung phenomenon. The implication, since the eigenvalues of
the velocity operator are , is again that a point particle carrying both
mass and charge can move in a circular orbit at the velocity of light.
Clearly, there is a problem.
Photon Zitterbewegung
It should be remembered that a photon is not a true particle in that it is

not localizable — a subject that will be discussed latter in this section —
but represents the minimum amount of energy that an electromagnetic
wave can carry, and a wave can only carry multiples of this minimal
amount. It was Einstein that introduced the idea of a photon in an attempt
to deal with the wave-particle dilemma early in the history of quantum
mechanics. To quote Leon Rosenfeld, Einstein made the qualitative
suggestion “that the photons, or the light quanta as they were called then,
were some kind of singularity, of concentration of energy and
momentum inside a radiation field. The radiation field would so to speak
guide the photons in such a way as to produce also the interference a
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diffraction phenomena . . . .” [23] The confused interpretation of a

photon as a particle continues to this day. Einstein’s suggestion is found
in the de Broglie-Bohm interpretation of quantum mechanics.
To discuss photon zitterbewegung, one needs a wave equation for the

photon. The approach that will be used to find one is based on that of
Bialynicki-Birula. [25] The result will be an Schrödinger like wave
equation for the photon. This will then allow the Hamiltonian for the
photon to be identified.
D’Alenbert’s equation
(Ad 2.5)
will be used a guide for finding an analogous relation for a spin-1

massless particle like the photon. Taking the square root of this equation
gives
(Ad 2.6)
The photon having spin-1 suggests that the three Hermitian matrices
representing infinitesimal rotations for spin-1, be the
starting point for finding a wave equation for the photon. These matrices
are
(Ad 2.7)
They obey the anti-commutation relations,
(Ad 2.8)
Multiply both sides of this relation by , and rearrange the terms to

get
(Ad 2.9)
If we let this operator relation operate on ,
(Ad 2.10)
The first term on the right hand side vanishes unless a = b; choose this to
be the case. Then when the remaining index is summed over, the second
term becomes ∙ , which — since there are no sources — will be
assumed to vanish. The resulting equation is true for all a so the index
can be dropped. Dropping the from both sides leaves only the operator
relation, which can be written as
(Ad 2.11)
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Now multiply both sides by and compare the result with Eq. (A2.6).
This comparison suggests that , the wave function for the photon, be
considered to be a 3-component spinor
(Ad 2.12)
where the are scalar functions. On a component basis then, we have
which is to be compared to
(Ad 2.13)
This leads to the final classical result to be written as
(Ad 2.14)
This can be converted into a quantum mechanical expression by simply

multiplying both sides by
(Ad 2.15)
The Hamiltonian for the photon is then ∓ ∙ . For positive energy

choose the + sign, which corresponds to +helicity. Since the Si are pure
imaginary, sign reversal corresponds to complex conjugation.
Using Eq. (Ad 2.7), the Hamiltonian in component form can be written
as
(Ad 2.16)
To be consistent with Kobe, [26, 27] relabel the indices by

giving .
Hamilton’s equation for the velocity is . If v and H are

considered to be operators, one can write
(Ad 2.17)
Thus, is the same as ∙ . This is the form of the

Hamiltonian that will be used to compute the zitterbewegung.
The time derivative of an operator in the Heisenberg representation,

dO O
 i  H,O   , can be used to compute the derivative with respect to
dt dt
time of the velocity operator,
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(Ad 2.18)
Following Kobe, the dyadic form for H has been introduced to facilitate
the integration of this equation when and are operators. Since dyadic
notation is used only sparsely in the modern physics literature, the key to
understanding Eq. (Ad 2.18) is the relation
(Ad 2.19)
The first term on the left hand side within the parentheses is a dyad; note
that there is no operation defined between the vectors. Thus,
and
(Ad 2.20)
Operating on the left with and integrating from 0 to t gives
(Ad 2.21)
Note that while the calculation is somewhat tedious, one can explicitly
show that using the matrix definitions for given
above in Eq. (Ad 2.17).
Now is a constant velocity operator, which means that depends

entirely on . At t = 0, the velocity is directed along the momentum,
, where . Then can be written in

terms of its components parallel and perpendicular to , as
. At t = 0, only is not zero but at a later
time this is not the case, so that in terms of the parallel and perpendicular
components one can write
(Ad 2.22)
The only condition is that ̂ ∙ 0. If Eq. (Ad 2.22) is integrated, we

get what Kobe calls a “displacement operator” (it cannot be called a
“position operator” since the photon is not localizable), which leads to a
short digression on position operators in quantum mechanics.
Newton and Wigner and Pryce have given thorough discussions of

position operators. It is the spin that is responsible for the photon’s non-
localizability. [28] If the photon had spin zero, it would be localizable.
Newton-Wigner derive an expression for the position coordinate for
arbitrary spin, but for spin ½ it agrees with Pryce who defines the center
of mass in coordinates where the coordinates taken in pairs have
vanishing Poisson brackets. In such a frame, the total momentum
vanishes, and the center of mass is at rest — a result that is frame
dependent. Note that the center of mass of a single particle is the same as
the position of the particle. Pryce concludes, “From the point of view of
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relativistic quantum mechanics the only ‘position vector’ that has much
interest is the one which is relativistically covariant . . . The fact that its
components do not commute leads to an uncertainty in the simultaneous
measurement of order / .” Or, as put by Bacry, “either it is
impossible to measure any coordinate, that is there is no position
operator, or the position operator has three non-commuting components”.
In particular, massive particles with spin can be localized to a minimal
uncertainty in one frame of reference, but in another frame it will not be
localized — localized states are not transformed into localized states
under Lorentz transformations.
Returning to the discussion of Eq. (Ad 2.22), remembering that

/ the integral of the equation is
(Ad 2.23)
But rather than integrating this equation in its present form, it is

advantageous to first determine the form of .
It was shown in Eq. (Ad 2.15) that the Hamiltonian for the photon wave
function is ∓ ∙ . The positive sign was chosen corresponding to a
positive helicity. What the ± sign means is that there are two independent
parts of the wave function corresponding to the positive and negative
states of helicity. Bialynicki-Birula introduced a 6-dimensional
wave function with a single evolution equation to deal with the two
helicity states of the photon. Another way to introduce helicity, following

Kobe, is to write 0 in Eq. (Ad 2.23) in terms of two orthogonal
components such that the two circular polarization vectors , where
1, are given by
(Ad 2.24)
The arrangement of these vectors is shown in Fig. (Ad 2.1).
Figure Ad 2.1. The arrangement of the three vectors 0 , 0 , and

the momentum ̂ ∙ 0 and 0 have the same magnitude and are
/2 out of phase.
Given these definitions, the time variation can now be written as
(Ad 2.25)
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where / . It is important to keep in mind that despite the

somewhat misleading vector notation, 0 and 0 are operators. As
vectors they and ̂ only have one component as seen in Fig. (Ad 2.1).
The vector notation is useful, however, since it implies that
, or
,
which is the same as . The operators

0 and 0 thus obey the anti-commutation relation and therefore
do not commute. [29]
If the exponentials in Eq. (Ad 2.25) are expanded, the real part is taken,
may be written as
(Ad 2.26)
This equation may now be integrated, giving
(Ad 2.27)
Kobe calls the second term on the left-hand side the “constant
displacement”. ∥ 0 corresponds to the displacement along the
direction of the constant momentum ̂ . The amplitude of the
zitterbewegung is c/ and is a consequence of the magnitude of the
eigenvalues of the velocity operators being c. c/ is, of course, the

wavelength divided by 2. But since the wavelength depends on the
frame of reference, this is a good example of the non-localizability of the
photon. The last two terms explicitly display the zitterbewegung.
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References and Notes
[1] P.R. Holland, The Quantum Theory of Motion (Cambridge University

Press, Cambridge 1993).
[2] D. Hestenes, “The Zitterbewegung Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics,
Found. Phys. 20,1213-1232 (1990); “Electron time, mass and zitter”,
available on-line; “Zitterbewegung in Quantum Mechanics — a research
program”, arXiv:0802.2728 [quant-ph] 2008.
[3] This “internal clock” is also built into the Dirac equation
For p = 0, this equation has four solutions, two of which have the time

dependence and two the time dependence .

Setting , one has . As we shall see,
this frequency is not the same as the zitterbewegung frequency, which is

twice this value.
[4] L. de Broglie, Recherches sur la Théorie des Quanta (Masson & Cie, Paris
1963).
[5] Max Born, Atomic Physics (Hafner Publishing Co., N.Y., 1957), p. 90]
[6] H. J. Kreiner, et al., Phys. Lett. 33A, 135 (1970).
[7] A. Ja, Bobudaev, et al., Phys. Lett. 45A, 71 (1973).
[8] P. Catillon, et al., Found. Phys. 38, 659 (2008).
[9] M. Bauer, arXiv: 1403.4580 [quant-ph] 2014.
[10] R. Penrose, The Road to Reality (Alfred A. Knopf, New York 2005), §25.2.
[11] See, for example, H.K. Dreiner, et al., arXiv:0812.1594v5 [hep-ph] (2010).
[12] K. Grotz and H.V. Klapdor, The Weak Interactions in Nuclear, Particle
and Astrophysics (Adam Hilger, New York 1990), §7.1.1 and Appendix
A.1.2.3.
[13] R. G. Sachs, The Physics of Time Reversal (University of Chicago Press,

Chicago 1987).
[14] S. De Leo and P. Rotelli, Int. J. Theor. Phys. 37, 2193-2206 (1998).
[15] F. Halzen and A. Martin, Quarks and Leptons (John Wiley & Sons, New
York 1984), p. 338.
[16] Max Born, Atomic Physics (Hafner Publishing Company, New York
1957), p. 97.
[17] T.D. Newton and E.P. Wigner, Rev. Mod. Phys. 21, 400 (1949).
[18] M.H.L. Pryce, Proc. Roy. Soc. 195A, 62 (1948).
[19] J.A. Wheeler, Phys. Rev. 97, 511 (1955); Geometrodynamics (Academic
Press, New York 1962).
[20] B. Zwiebach, A First Course in String Theory (Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge 2009).
[21] D. Tong, String Theory, arXiv [hep-th] 0908.0333v3 (23 Feb 2012).
[22] K. Huang, Am. J. Phys. 20, 479-484 (1952).
[23] J. Mehra (ed), The Physicists Conception of Nature, (D. Teidel Publishing
Co., Dordrecht-Holland 1973), pp. 251-263.
[24] J. Mehra (ed), The Physicists Conception of Nature, (D. Teidel Publishing
Co., Dordrecht-Holland 1973), pp. 251-263.
[25] I. Bialynicki-Birula, ACTA Physica Polonica A, 86, 97 (1994).
[26] D.H. Kobe, Found. Phys. 29, 1203 (1999).
[27] D.H. Kobe, Phys. Lett. A 253, 7 (1999).
[28] H. Bacry, Localizability and Space in Quantum Physics (Springer-Verlag,
New York 1988)
[29] In quantum optics, when one has a wave function of the form
X cost + Y sint, when X and Y do not commute they are called
“quadratures”, and by manipulation of these operators one can “squeeze”
the light, a process that is called “quadrature squeezing”.
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Appendix B: Spinor Representations
of the Lorentz Group

If   is a Lorentz transformation one has

Because this is true for all x ,
 
       .
The group of matrices satisfying this relation is a Lie group called
O(3,1). The elements of O(3,1) that can be built up infinitesimally from
the identity is a subgroup called SO(3,1). Thus, the Lorentz
transformations infinitesimally close to the identity must have the form
  
  =     

where   is a matrix of infinitesimal coefficients. Inserting this into the
previous equation for   shows that  is antisymmetric on its
indices. With the convention that 00 = 1 and ii = 1, the most general

form for   is
0 b1 b2 b3
 b1 0 r 3 r2
 = .
b2 r3 0 r 1
b3 r 2 r1 0
The b’s give infinitesimal boosts in the subscripted directions and the r’s
rotations about the indicated axes.
137
To operate on Hilbert space, each element   SO(3,1) must have

associated with it a unitary operator U satisfying
U  1 U  2 = U  1 2 .
Infinitesimally close to the identity, these operators can be expanded as
U     i   J + O  
 

where the operators J
 are antisymmetric in  and . This series can be
written in exponential form as

i  J 
U   e 
.
Defining the operators
 ijk 0
J i := J jk, K i := J i,
2
which are, respectively, the generators of rotations and boosts along the
i-axis. These operators satisfy the commutation relations
J i, J j = i ijk J k,
J i, K j = i ijkK k,
K i, K j = i ijk J k.
Next, we define, in terms of the latter, the operators
J i + iK i J i  iK i
L i := , Ri := ,
2 2
which obey the commutation relations
L i, L j = i ijk L k,
Ri, R j = i ijk Rk,
L i, R j = 0.
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Appendix B: Spinor Representations of the Lorentz Group 139
What has been done is to split the generators of SO(3,1) into two subsets
that commute with each other and which individually satisfy the
commutation relations for SU(2). Now we can introduce the spinor
representations.
The simplest nontrivial matrices that satisfy these commutation relations

are the Pauli matrices i . Now set Li and Ri in the above equation equal
to i /2 and 0 respectively; then invert the relations to find Ji and Ki as
i i
Ji = , K i = i .
2 2
This corresponds to a right-handed spinor and, for spin ½ is designated
by (½, 0). They satisfy the set of commutation relations given above for J
and K. Alternatively, if we set Li and Ri in the above equation equal to 0
and i /2 respectively, and then again invert the relations to find Ji and
Ki, we would obtain
i i
Ji = , Ki = i .
2 2
This corresponds to a left-handed spinor and, for spin ½ is designated by
(0, ½).
If, as in the body of this book, we consider fields and designate the right
and left-handed spinor fields as R and L, and put them together into a
4-spinor, it would transform under a Lorentz transformation as
  i r i + ib i  i
R e 2 0 R
 =  =  i r i  ib i  i
L
,
L 0 e 2
where the ri and bi are as in the expression given above for the most
ఓ
general form for the ߱ఔ . This is more general than the expression given
in the body of this book because it includes rotations as well as boosts.

The exponential terms in the matrix can be obtained from exponential
form of U() given above, by writing out explicitly J in terms of the
Pauli matrices for the two choices of Ji and Ki (corresponding to (0, ½)

and (½, 0), the left-handed and right handed spinor representations of the

Lorentz group), and using the matrix given above for   to carry out
the sum indicated. Note that in obtaining the components of J

0
involving time from the relation K i := J i, one must use   with
signature +2.
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Appendix C: The Schwinger Term
The Schwinger term is given by
ST y,x =  y,J x .
(C1)
Taking the divergence of the Schwinger term and using the relation
i H 0,  x =   J x , (C2)
where H 0 is the free-field Hamiltonian when the electromagnetic

4-potential vanishes, results in
 x  y , J x =  y , J x = i  y , H 0,  x .
(C3)
Expanding the commutator on the right hand side of Eq. (C3) yields the
vacuum expectation value
i x 0  y,J x 0 =  0 H0  x  y 0 +
0  x H 0 y 0 + 0  y H 0 x 0  0  y  x H 0 0 .
(C4)
It is here that one makes the assumption that the vacuum is the lowest
energy state. This is done by writing H 0 |0> = <0|H 0 = 0. As a result,
Eq. (C4) may be written as
i x 0  y,J x 0 = 0  x H 0 y 0 +
0  y H 0 x 0 .
(C5)
141
Multiply both sides of the last equation by f(x)f(y) and integrate over x
and y. The right hand side of Eq. (C5) becomes
dx dy 0 f x  x H0 f y  y 0 + 0 f y  y H0 f x  x 0 .
(C6)
If Schwinger’s “arbitrary linear functional of the charge density” is

defined as
F = f x  x dx = f y  y dy ,
(C7)
the right hand side of Eq. (C5) becomes
 0 F m m H0 n n F 0 =
2 0 FH 0F 0 = 2m,n
2 E n 0 F n n F 0 = 2
2
n n
En 0 F n > 0.
(C8)
The left hand side of Eq. (C8) — essentially the form used by
Schwinger — is here expanded to explicitly show the non-vanishing
matrix elements between the vacuum and the other states of necessarily
positive energy. This shows that if the vacuum is assumed to be the
lowest energy state, the Schwinger term cannot vanish, and the theory is
not gauge invariant.
For the sake of completeness, it is readily shown that the left side
of Eq. (C5) becomes
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Appendix C: The Schwinger Term 143
i  x 0  y ,J x 0 f x f y dxdy = i 0  tF, F 0 ,
(C9)
so that combining Eqs. (C8) and (C9) yields a somewhat more explicit
form of the result given by Schwinger,
 tF, F 0 = 2
2
i 0 En 0 F n > 0.
n (C10)
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b2530_FM.indd 6 01-Sep-16 11:03:06 AM

Appendix D: The Cosmic
Microwave Background Radiation
The cosmic microwave background radiation is extremely important in

cosmology because, in addition to the expansion of the universe seen
from the red shift of light from distant galaxies, it shows that the universe
had a very hot beginning. The radiation has an almost perfect black body
spectrum of ~2.8 degrees K as seen below:
Cosmic Microwave Background Spectrum from COBE

400
COBE Data
350 Black Body Spectrum
300
Intensity [MJy/sr]
250
200
150
100
50
0
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22
Frequency [1/cm]
One often sees the very small variations in this background radiation
plotted against a map of the sky known as the celestial sphere. It looks
like the figure below:
145
One can gain a great deal more information from the data contained in
this map by plotting them as a spherical harmonic decomposition known
as the power spectrum of the spatial fluctuations. This is shown in the
figure below. The key to understanding this figure is understanding that
the temperature variance associated with the lth multipole moment in the
figure measures the mean-square temperature difference between points
o
on the celestial sphere separated by angles of 180 /l. Specifically, the
temperature variance is given by l (l + 1) Cl /2, where Cl is the
coefficient of the lth multipole moment, which measures the mean-square
temperature variance and has the units K2. Note that the temperature is
squared.
While it cannot be readily seen in this figure, there is a significant

discrepancy between the observed temperature variance at the l = 2
quadrupole compared to the theoretical value. This is confirmed by the
next few harmonics,† which are also not visible. Cl corresponds to the
† R. Penrose, The Road to Reality (Alfred A. Knopf, New York 2005), §28.10.
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Angular Scale
90º 2º 0.5º 0.2º
6000
WMAP
Acbar
5000 Boomerang
CBI
VSA
4000
Variance (µK2)
Temperature
3000
2000
1000
0
10 100 500 1000 1500
Multipole Order l
theoretical power spectrum. If the observed power spectrum corresponds

to Clobs, then the fractional difference between these two multipole
coefficients is known as the cosmic variance (shown by the shading in
the figure), which depends on l and is given by
where the outside brackets on the left hand side of this equation represent
an angular average. This discrepancy is inconsistent with the scale-
invariance predicted by some inflationary scenarios for the observed
temperature fluctuations.
The peaks in this figure are due to “acoustic” compressional waves in the
viscous-elastic “fluid” — primarily composed of hydrogen and helium
ions, electrons, and photons — that characterized the plasma epoch of
the universe around 400,000 years after the “Big Bang”. The “acoustic”
oscillations are also known as gravitationally driven photon-baryon
oscillations.
The first peak is at an l of about 200 corresponding to an angular scale of

o o o
about 1 on the sky; that is, 180 /l ~ 1 . This is what would be expected if
the path of the greater than 10 Gyr journey of the radiation from
~400,000 years after the “Big Bang” were not distorted by the geometry
of the universe; that is, the position of the first and largest peak tells us
that the universe is flat — it has no curvature.
The height of the second peak (really a cold spot peak, as are the 4th, 6th,
etc. peaks — remember, the temperature is squared in the plot) relative to
first peak turns out to be a sensitive measure of the baryon density in the
plasma. Teasing out the baryon density from the data is non-trivial, and
there are many publications on the subject. One nice discussion is given
in the Master’s thesis by Reijo Keskitalo available from the website at:
http://ethesis.helsinki.fi/julkaisut/mat/fysik/pg/keskitalo/
The study of type Ia supernovae, thought to represent a “standard candle”

throughout the universe, tells us that the expansion of the universe has
actually been speeding up for the last ~5 Gyr. This implies that the
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vacuum itself has an energy density associated with it. If this is
designated as ; the total mass density of the universe as M; the
normal matter baryon density as B; and we normalized the total to that
for a flat universe (TOT = 1), as required by the first peak in the power
spectrum of the spatial fluctuations of the cosmic background radiation,
then the composition of the universe would be given by
TOT =  + M + B = 1.
The breakdown, as currently understood, is as follows: M = 0.24 of

which normal matter B = 0.04 makes up only a small part, and
 = 0.76. So the universe is made up of about ~4% normal matter,
~20% “dark” matter, whose composition is unknown but has so far been
found to interact only through gravitation, and ~76% of so called “dark
energy”, indistinguishable from Einstein’s cosmological constant.
A Few Reference Books
The following list of references is by no means representative of the vast

array of books and articles published on the subject matter discussed
above. Of the many fine books that I consulted, these simply represent a
few that I found particularly well written. The scientific literature is far
too vast to be referred to here and key references may be found in the
books below.
Aitchison, I. J. R., and Hey, A. J. G., Gauge Theories in Particle Physics

(Institute of Physics Publishing 1989).
Aitchison, I. J. R., An Informal Introduction to Gauge Field Theories

(Cambridge University Press 1984).
Halzen, F. and Martin, A. D. Quarks and Leptons: An Introductory

Course in Modern Particle Physics (John Wiley and Sons 1984).
Moriyasu, K., An Elementary Primer for Gauge Theory (World

Scientific 1983)
Ryder, L. H., Quantum Field Theory (Cambridge University Press 1996).
151
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Sternberg, S., Group Theory and Physics (Cambridge University Press

1994).
Weyl, H., Symmetry (Princeton University Press 1952).

Index
antiquark, 29, 53, 60, 70 Gell-Mann matrices, 55

automorphism, 5 Gell-Mann Nishijima relation, 28
baryon, 28, 29, 60, 148, 149 gluon, 29, 50, 54, 55, 56, 57, 67, 70, 80
BCS theory, 40 group
bosonic strings, 105 factor, 5, 6
bulk, 105, 112 group generators, 20, 21, 23
Casimir effect, 80 homomorphism, 5
channeling resonance, 88 Lorentz group, viii, 9, 10, 12, 88, 140
chirality, 13, 67, 78, 89, 90, 91, 92, 115, Poincare group, 9
116 helicity, 10, 89, 90, 127, 131
chromoelectric field, 70 Higgs field, 29, 40, 44, 48, 49, 51, 53,
coset, 5, 38 80, 91, 92, 93, 98, 99, 100, 101, 103
cosmological constant, 79, 80, 149 Hilbert space, 4, 74, 75, 138
current hypercharge, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31, 33, 35,
electromagnetic, 30, 32, 35 45, 59, 73, 115
hypercharge, 30, 31, 33, 35 isospin, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 43,
neutral, 29, 30, 32, 34, 35 45, 48, 59, 65, 115, 116
weak, 32 Kalb-Ramond, 106, 107, 109
D-brane, 104, 105, 110 Lie algebra, 21, 28, 32
de Broglie, Louis, vii, 15, 16, 84, 85, 86, linear space, 4
87, 89, 118, 119, 121, 124, 134 meson, 27, 28, 64, 95
Dirac equation, vii, viii, 10, 12, 13, 15, Noether theorem, 37
16, 17, 20, 26, 33, 48, 84, 88, 89, 94, normal subgroup, 5, 6, 7, 26
99, 101, 103, 121, 123, 134 phase transition, 40, 77, 79
displacement operator, 130 phase velocity, 16, 85, 86, 118
Einstein, Albert, 149 phase wave, 15
electron channeling, 86 quantum chromodynamics, 39, 49
factor group, 5, 6 quark, 29, 44, 48, 50, 53, 55, 56, 59, 60,
fiber bundle, 22, 25 61, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 78, 80,
flux tube, 70, 114 103
gauge boson, 36, 37, 38, 44, 46, 48, 51, representation
52 irreducible representation, 6, 9, 61,
gauge theory, 2, 22, 25, 40 62, 63
153
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matrix representation, 2, 20 global, 40

simple group, 5, 26 hidden, 1
Sommerfeld rosettes, 86 local, 22
spontaneous symmetry breaking, 29, 33, manifest, 1
36, 39, 44, 45, 53, 77 symmetry transformation, 21, 22, 42, 75
strangeness, 28, 64 U(1), 2, 21, 23, 25, 26, 28, 30, 31, 33,
string theory, viii, 104, 106, 109, 114, 40, 42, 44, 46
115, 117, 118 vacuum state, 36, 37, 38, 42, 43, 44, 75,
strong coupling constant, 69 77, 81
SU(2), 5, 21, 25, 26, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, wave function, 15, 19, 22, 23, 24, 33, 36,
35, 45, 48, 52, 139 66, 72, 90, 91, 92, 101, 102, 126,
SU(3), 5, 21, 25, 26, 28, 52, 53, 55, 56, 131, 135
57, 58, 62, 64, 65, 115 weight diagram, 60, 62
superstrings, 105 world-sheet, 105
symmetry zitterbewegung, 88, 89, 97, 99, 114,
breaking, 2, 29, 33, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 115, 121, 123, 125, 128, 133, 134
42, 43, 44, 45, 49, 53, 67, 76, 77, 79,
93, 94, 116

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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STANDARD MODEL OF PARTICLE PHYSICS

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point particle despite its difficulties in both classical and quantum

A Semblance of the Dirac Equation From Groups 9

Arbitrary Gauge Group Local Symmetry Transformations

Addendum 1: Electron Channeling Resonance in Crystals 118

Appendix D: The Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation 145

In discussing the general mathematical idea of symmetry, Herman Weyl

When speaking of symmetry in quantum field theory one often defines

Let us move on to two dimensions. If x1 and x2 are the coordinates of a

If the det(A) = a11a22a12a21 ≠ 0, and we require that length be preserved

A Hilbert space is a linear space over the field of complex numbers,

automorphism of G. When this is the case, N is said to be self-conjugate.

only the identity and G as normal subgroups. The Standard Model of

Matrix representations were introduced above as a homomorphism from

Suppose that N is a normal subgroup of G. Then there is a bijective —

The direct product of the groups G and N is written as G  N. If N is an

invariant subgroup of G, then the group G is the direct product of the

A Semblance of the Dirac

In quantum mechanics particles are characterized by, in addition to their

Eugene Wigner’s contributions to the role of groups in physics are

It is assumed in what follows that the reader is familiar with Minkowski

The discussion below is based on that given in Ryder’s book on quantum

Under a general Lorentz transformation, there are two types of

Consider first R. If the exponent of the relevant exponential is written

where n is a unit vector in the direction of the Lorentz boost. Now

definition of the four momentum, p = (E,p), the last two equations

may be expressed in matrix form as

This is the promised semblance of the Dirac equation. It was derived

Minimalist Quantum Mechanics

The origination of quantum mechanics dates back to Max Planck in 1900

De Broglie in his 1924 publication “Recherches sur la Théorie des

This identification is the key step used by de Broglie in deriving his

The two relations, E = h and  p = h allow us to derive what is needed to

The gauge principle is fundamental to the standard model of particle

acquires a phase factor that depends on the vector potential A

constant, then Ψ′ , is a solution of the free-particle wave equation.

throughout space and time. Allowing  to have a space- time dependence

4-potential A. Put another way, if is replaced by in

A´ that results from allowing  to have a space-time dependence lets

At this point, in order to generalize the covariant derivative for fields

where G(0) is the identity matrix. The infinitesimal group generators, Xi

Given the group generators, the vector potential A of electromagnetism

The symmetry transformations that result from the group generators —

commutator implies that the are also antisymmeteric in the lower

groups (where matrices of the representation do not commute).

Arbitrary Gauge Group Local Symmetry Transformations and

The space-time dependence is carried by the parameters i(x). As the

The wave function of the particle can then be written as

spin; i (x) should be thought of as a component of  (x) in the basis ui.

For i = j, when the group generator matrix vanishes, becomes the

The change in the wave function then becomes

Standard Model Beginnings

The Standard Model brings together three of the fundamental forces of

represent g as a 6  6 block diagonal matrix having the form