The Y(4260) is an anomalous particle with an energy of 4260
MeV
In physics, an electronvolt (symbol eV, also written electron-volt and electron volt) is the measure of an amount of kinetic energy gained by a single electron accelerating from rest through an electric potential difference of one volt in vacu ...
which does not appear to fit into the
quark model
In particle physics, the quark model is a classification scheme for hadrons in terms of their valence quarks—the quarks and antiquarks which give rise to the quantum numbers of the hadrons. The quark model underlies "flavor SU(3)", or the Ei ...
. It was discovered by the
BaBar experiment
The BaBar experiment, or simply BaBar, is an international collaboration of more than 500 physicists and engineers studying the subatomic world at energies of approximately ten times the rest mass of a proton (~10 GeV). Its design was motiva ...
at
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
for the
Department of Energy A Ministry of Energy or Department of Energy is a government department in some countries that typically oversees the production of fuel and electricity; in the United States, however, it manages nuclear weapons development and conducts energy-re ...
in
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
and later confirmed by several other experimental collaborations. It being a
Charmonium
In particle physics, quarkonium (from quark and -onium, pl. quarkonia) is a flavorless meson whose constituents are a heavy quark and its own antiquark, making it both a neutral particle and its own antiparticle.
Light quarks
Light quarks ( up ...
state is unlikely because the Y(4260) is heavier than the threshold for production of two
D meson
The D mesons are the lightest particle containing charm quarks. They are often studied to gain knowledge on the weak interaction. The strange D mesons (Ds) were called "F mesons" prior to 1986.
Overview
The D mesons were discove ...
s, yet sits, surprisingly in a dip in the production rate for pairs of D's.
It is a possibility that it is a hybrid—a predicted but not-yet-seen type of particle, where a
gluon is actually a permanent part of the makeup of the particle, instead of just an ephemeral messenger keeping the
quarks bound together.
See also
*
Meson
In particle physics, a meson ( or ) is a type of hadronic subatomic particle composed of an equal number of quarks and antiquarks, usually one of each, bound together by the strong interaction. Because mesons are composed of quark subparticles, ...
*
XYZ particle
XYZ particles, also referred to as XYZ states, are recently discovered heavy mesons whose properties do not appear to fit the standard picture of charmonium and bottomonium states. They are therefore types of exotic meson. The term arises from th ...
*
X(3872) The X(3872) is an exotic meson candidate with a mass of 3871.68 MeV/c2 which does not fit into the quark model because of its quantum numbers. It was first discovered in 2003 by the Belle experiment in Japan and later confirmed by several other exp ...
*
Z(4430)
Z(4430) is a mesonic resonance discovered by the Belle experiment. It has a mass of . The resonant nature of the peak has been confirmed by the LHCb experiment with a significance of at least 13.9 σ. The particle is charged and is thought ...
*
Zc(3900)
The Zc(3900) is a hadron, a type of subatomic particle made of quarks, believed to be the first tetraquark that has been observed experimentally. The discovery was made in 2013 by two independent research groups: one using the BES III detector a ...
References
Mesons
2006 in science
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