New Math Suggests 'Impossible' Third Type of Particle Could Exist
Quantum mechanics has long classified particles into just two distinct types: fermions and bosons.
Now physicists from Rice University in the US have found a third type might be possible after all, at least mathematically speaking. Known as a paraparticles, their behavior could imply the existence of elementary particles nobody has ever considered.
"We determined that new types of particles we never knew of before are possible," says Kaden Hazzard, who with co-author Zhiyuan Wang formulated a theory to demonstrate how objects that weren't fermions or bosons could exist in physical reality without breaking any known laws.
Fermions encompass fundamental particles that 'build' atoms, such as electrons and quarks. In more precise terms, they have a property that prevents them from occupying identical quantum states, effectively ensuring no two matching fermions can fill the same space.
"This behavior is responsible for the whole structure of the periodic table," says Hazzard. "It's also why you don't just go through your chair when you sit down."
Bosons are defined by a different measure to this property that allows them to pass right through one another like ghosts in a corridor.
Typically acting as force carriers like photons and gluons, bosons mediate interactions in ways that push and pull fermions into everything from protons to porcupines to potatoes to planets.
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