Boson, << BOH son, >> is any member of a certain class of atomic and subatomic particles. Every particle is either a boson or a fermion. Bosons include photons, the particles of light.
The simplest bosons are the fundamental, or gauge, bosons. These are elementary particles–that is, they have no known smaller parts. Fundamental bosons transmit the fundamental forces between other particles. One particle gives off a boson, and the other absorbs it.
There are three well-known types of fundamental bosons: (1) photons, (2) gluons, and (3) weak bosons. Photons transmit electromagnetic forces. Photons whose energy falls within a certain range are the particles of light. Gluons transmit the strong nuclear force, or strong interaction, which holds the particles in nuclei together. There are eight kinds of gluons. Weak bosons transmit the weak nuclear force, or weak interaction, which is responsible for several forms of radioactivity. Weak bosons also play a major role in the nuclear reactions that power the sun and other stars. There are three kinds of weak bosons–two W bosons and the Z boson.
Commonly accepted theories of matter include two other kinds of fundamental bosons. The Higgs boson is the source of the mass that most particles carry. In 2012, scientists announced they had discovered the Higgs boson. The evidence was collected using a particle accelerator called the Large Hadron Collider. The graviton transmits gravitational force. Scientists have yet to discover evidence of this boson.
Bosons also include composite objects made up of an even number of fermions. The composite object can be a nucleus, an atom, or a molecule.
Bosons differ from fermions in spin, a measure of internal rotation. Bosons have whole-integer values of spin (0, 1, 2, and so forth). Fermions have half-number values (1/2, 3/2, 5/2, and so forth).
Bosons were named for the Indian physicist Satyendra Nath Bose, who first proposed a theory of their behavior in the 1920’s. The work of German-born physicist Albert Einstein completed the theory.
See also Higgs boson; Supersymmetry.
