Spontaneous symmetry breaking, gauge theories, the Higgs mechanism and all that
1974; American Physical Society; Volume: 46; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1103/revmodphys.46.7
ISSN1539-0756
Autores Tópico(s)Quantum Chromodynamics and Particle Interactions
ResumoA more or less self-contained introductory review is presented of the so-called Higgs phenomenon. This is the mechanism by which, in a certain class of gauge theories, the "photon" and would-be Goldstone scalar mesons conspire together to produce massive vector mesons via a "spontaneous" breaking of gauge invariance. It is conceivable that this is the way in which nature has chosen to unify weak and electromagnetic interactions. It is hoped that a reader of this review will come to understand the meaning of the first three sentences in this abstract and will then be able to proceed to confront a rapidly growing literature in the subject of gauge theories.
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