Charm quark

The charm quark is an elementary particle with electric charge +2/3 and charm quantum number +1. It forms hadrons including J/ψ and D mesons.

Quark: A quark is an elementary fermion that participates in the strong interaction and combines with other quarks to form hadrons. Charm is one of the six quark flavors.
J/ψ meson: The J/ψ meson is a charmonium state made of a charm quark and a charm antiquark. Its discovery in 1974 provided compelling evidence for the charm quark.
Sheldon Glashow: Sheldon Glashow is a theoretical physicist who shared the 1979 Nobel Prize for work on electroweak theory. He proposed a fourth quark with John Iliopoulos and Luciano Maiani to suppress rare weak processes.
GIM mechanism: The GIM mechanism suppresses flavor-changing neutral processes through cancellations involving quark generations. Its original formulation predicted charm as a way to explain the suppression.
Up quark: The up quark is a light quark with electric charge +2/3 and up quantum number +1. It shares charm’s electric charge but is far lighter and has a different flavor.
Quark model: The quark model classifies hadrons as combinations of quarks and antiquarks. It predicts hadron families containing charm alongside lighter quarks.
D meson: A D meson is a hadron containing one charm quark or charm antiquark and a light quark or antiquark. D mesons are prominent open-charm states.
John Iliopoulos: John Iliopoulos is a theoretical physicist known for work on particle physics and the GIM mechanism. His 1970 work with Glashow and Maiani motivated the charm quark.
Cabibbo–Kobayashi–Maskawa matrix: The Cabibbo–Kobayashi–Maskawa matrix describes mixing among quark flavors in weak interactions. Its matrix elements determine which weak decays of charm quarks are favored.
Strange quark: The strange quark is a quark with electric charge −1/3 and strangeness quantum number −1. Strange hadrons provide a lighter-flavor comparison for charm-containing particles.

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