Down quarkとは 意味・読み方・使い方

The down quark or d quark (from its symbol, d) is the second-lightest of all quarks, a type of elementary particle, and a major constituent of matter. It, along with the up quark, forms the neutrons (one up quark, two down quarks) and protons (two up quarks, one down quark) of atomic nuclei. It is part of the first generation of matter, has an electric charge of −¹⁄₃ e and a bare mass of 4.1–5.8 MeV/c2. Like all quarks, the down quark is an elementary fermion with spin-1⁄2, and experiences all four fundamental interactions: gravitation, electromagnetism, weak interactions, and strong interactions. The antiparticle of the down quark is the down antiquark (sometimes called antidown quark or simply antidown), which differs from it only in that some of its properties have equal magnitude but opposite sign.