Particle physics

Particle physics studies the elementary constituents of matter and energy and the interactions that govern them. Its current framework is the Standard Model, alongside evidence for phenomena it does not explain.

Standard Model: A quantum field theory describing known elementary particles and three of the four fundamental interactions. It organizes the particles and interactions at the center of the field.
Particle accelerator: A machine that uses electromagnetic fields to accelerate charged particles to high energies. Accelerators create energetic collisions that expose particle interactions.
Big Bang nucleosynthesis: The production of light atomic nuclei during the first minutes of the universe. Particle interaction rates help explain the observed primordial abundances.
Dark matter: Matter inferred from gravitational effects that does not emit, absorb, or reflect detectable light. No Standard Model particle accounts for the gravitational evidence for dark matter.
Elementary particle: A particle not known to consist of smaller constituents. These are the basic entities particle physics investigates.
Particle detector: An instrument that records signals produced when particles interact with matter or fields. Its measurements reconstruct the products of particle collisions and decays.
Baryogenesis: A class of proposed processes that produced the universe's excess of matter over antimatter. Particle physics supplies candidate mechanisms for this cosmic asymmetry.
Dark energy: The name for the cause of the universe's observed accelerated expansion. The Standard Model does not explain the dominant component driving cosmic acceleration.
Fundamental interaction: A basic physical interaction not explained as a combination of other known interactions. Particle physics describes how elementary particles interact through these forces.
Collider: A particle accelerator that brings two particle beams into collision. Colliders concentrate collision energy into a small region to produce new particles.

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