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The Mysterious Forces Inside the Nucleus Grow a Little Less Strange | Quanta Magazine

The strong force holds protons and neutrons together, but the theory behind it is largely inscrutable. Two new approaches show how it works.

Click to view the original at quantamagazine.org

Hasnain says:

“Hyodo hopes that comprehensive knowledge of which two- and three-quark particles stick together could explain another mystery — why groupings of four or five quarks are so rare. Physicists have cataloged hundreds of quark duos and trios, but just a handful of tetraquarks and pentaquarks.

To that end, ALICE has been sifting through a billion or so collisions that took place between 2016 and 2018. Starting this spring, however, an upgrade to the LHC will let them take data 100 times faster. Over the next decade, Fabbietti expects to measure the mingling of rarer hadrons containing even heavier quarks.”

Posted on 2022-02-16T06:44:25+0000