The Standard Model of elementary particles, although very successful, contains various elements that are put in by hand. Understanding their origin requires going beyond the model and searching for “new physics”. The present book elaborates on one particular proposal concerning such physics. While the original conception is 50 years old, it has not lost its appeal over time. Its basic idea is that space — an arena of events treated in the Standard Model as a classical background — is a concept which emerges from a strictly discrete quantum layer in the limit of large quantum numbers. This book discusses an extension of this view by replacing space with phase space. It combines the results of the author's research papers and places them in much broader philosophical and phenomenological contexts, thus providing further arguments in favor of the proposed alternative. The book should be of interest to the philosophically-minded readers who are willing to contemplate unorthodox ideas on the very nature of the world.

The discovery of a new elementary particle at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in 2012 made headlines in world media. Since we already know of a large number of elementary particles, why did this latest discovery generate so much excitement? This small book reveals that this particle provides the key to understanding one of the most extraordinary phenomena which occurred in the early Universe. It introduces the mechanism that made possible, within tiny fractions of a second after the Big Bang, the generation of massive particles. The Origin of Mass is a guided tour of cosmic evolution, from the Big Bang to the elementary particles we study in our accelerators today. The guiding principle of this book is a concept of symmetry which, in a profound and fascinating way, seems to determine the structure of the Universe.

The first part of this two-part work is intended as an introduction to the fundamentals, while the second part discusses applications from the point of view of the researcher. Lively illustrations and informative tables, an overview at the beginning of each chapter and exercises with solutions make this book a valuable resource.

An Introduction to Elementary Particles, Second Edition aims to give an introduction to the theoretical methods and ideas used to describe how elementary particles behave, as well as interpret some of the phenomena associated with it. The book covers topics such as quantum mechanics; brats, kets, vectors, and linear operations; angular momentum; scattering and reaction theory; the polarization and angularization of spin-0-spin-1/2 scattering; and symettery, isotopic spin, and hypercharge. The book also discusses particles such as bosons, baryons, mesons, kaons, and hadrons, as well as the interactions between them. The text is recommended for physicists, especially those who are practitioners and researchers in the fields of quantum physics and elementary-particle physics.

This highly readable book uncovers the mysteries of the physics ofelementary particles for a broad audience. From the familiar notionsof atoms and molecules to the complex ideas of the grand unificationof all the basic forces, this book allows the interested lay public toappreciate the fascinating building blocks of matter that make up ouruniverse.

Introduces the fundamentals of particle physics with a focus on modern developments and an intuitive physical interpretation of results.