The Origin of Mass and the Feebleness of Gravity
The Origin of Mass and the Feebleness of Gravity
Frank Wilczek
Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, MIT
Wilczek starts out with saying he's going to explain the origin of mass -- but not all of it. He's going to stay away from dark matter and dark energy. He's going to stick to the 3% of ordinary matter.
What is mass? For the longest time, mass was simply there. It couldn't be reduced down to anything. Wilczek jokingly refers to Einstein's second law: m=E/c^2 -- as the time when the concept of mass started to make sense.
Most of ordinary matter is locked up in the nucleus of atoms -- which is made up of protons and neutrons -- which in term is made up of gluons and quarks. And we have a consistent theory -- one that combines quantum mechanics and general relativity: quantum chromodynamics. Wilczek goes on to explain the experiments at LEP, and how they led to clarity of QCD.
There is more detail to the lecture -- but I only got to half of it before other priorities called.
Frank Wilczek
Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics, MIT
Wilczek starts out with saying he's going to explain the origin of mass -- but not all of it. He's going to stay away from dark matter and dark energy. He's going to stick to the 3% of ordinary matter.
What is mass? For the longest time, mass was simply there. It couldn't be reduced down to anything. Wilczek jokingly refers to Einstein's second law: m=E/c^2 -- as the time when the concept of mass started to make sense.
Most of ordinary matter is locked up in the nucleus of atoms -- which is made up of protons and neutrons -- which in term is made up of gluons and quarks. And we have a consistent theory -- one that combines quantum mechanics and general relativity: quantum chromodynamics. Wilczek goes on to explain the experiments at LEP, and how they led to clarity of QCD.
There is more detail to the lecture -- but I only got to half of it before other priorities called.
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