lpetrich
Contributor
It looks like it. Particle Data Group - 2017 Review notes some very high lower limits of quark and lepton compositeness behavior, limits that were found with the Large Hadron Collider. The limits are a few TeV (tera electron volts or 10^(12) eV). This is very, very large compared to the masses of the up and down quarks, the quarks in protons and neutrons, and also the mass of the electron.
Why might this be so important? Let us consider the history of discovery of elementary-entity compositness. Survey of Scattering Investigations and Deep Inelastic Scattering of Electrons feature some of that history.
Atoms
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles will cause them to emit electrons, thus making them at least partially disintegrate. An experimentally clean demonstration of this effect is the photoelectric effect, where a sufficiently-energetic photon ejects an atom from a bulk material (Photoelectric Effect Definition and Explanation). Such a photon can also eject an electron from an isolated atom: ionization. The minimum energy to make this happen is a few eV (electron volts).
The maximum ratio of the minimum disintegration energy to an atom's mass is about 10^(-8), for hydrogen atoms.
Nuclei
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles, particles like photons, electrons, neutrinos, protons, neutrons, or other nuclei, make them at least partially disintegrate. The minimum energy to make this happen is around a few MeV, my estimate from binding energies of nuclei.
The maximum ratio of the minimum disintegration energy to an nucleus's mass is about 10^(-3), for deuteron nuclei.
Hadrons
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles, like electrons and other hadrons, make them disintegrate. As far as I know, all such experiments have been done on protons and neutrons, because those are the only hadrons stable enough to make good bulk targets. The minimum disintegration energy is 1 GeV (giga electron volts or 10^9 eV).
The ratio of this energy to the proton and neutron rest mass is close to 1.
Quarks and Leptons
From LHC experiments in pounding protons into each other, these particles have minimum disintegration energies of around 1 - 5 TeV. That is, one can pound these particles into each other, or at least the easier-to-accelerate ones, and they will not disintegrate. The up and down quarks have rest masses of a few MeV, and that makes their ratio of minimum disintegration energy to rest mass about 10^6. That's right -- a million.
So for (disintegration energy) / (rest mass), I have this summary:
Why might this be so important? Let us consider the history of discovery of elementary-entity compositness. Survey of Scattering Investigations and Deep Inelastic Scattering of Electrons feature some of that history.
Atoms
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles will cause them to emit electrons, thus making them at least partially disintegrate. An experimentally clean demonstration of this effect is the photoelectric effect, where a sufficiently-energetic photon ejects an atom from a bulk material (Photoelectric Effect Definition and Explanation). Such a photon can also eject an electron from an isolated atom: ionization. The minimum energy to make this happen is a few eV (electron volts).
The maximum ratio of the minimum disintegration energy to an atom's mass is about 10^(-8), for hydrogen atoms.
Nuclei
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles, particles like photons, electrons, neutrinos, protons, neutrons, or other nuclei, make them at least partially disintegrate. The minimum energy to make this happen is around a few MeV, my estimate from binding energies of nuclei.
The maximum ratio of the minimum disintegration energy to an nucleus's mass is about 10^(-3), for deuteron nuclei.
Hadrons
Pounding them with sufficiently-energetic particles, like electrons and other hadrons, make them disintegrate. As far as I know, all such experiments have been done on protons and neutrons, because those are the only hadrons stable enough to make good bulk targets. The minimum disintegration energy is 1 GeV (giga electron volts or 10^9 eV).
The ratio of this energy to the proton and neutron rest mass is close to 1.
Quarks and Leptons
From LHC experiments in pounding protons into each other, these particles have minimum disintegration energies of around 1 - 5 TeV. That is, one can pound these particles into each other, or at least the easier-to-accelerate ones, and they will not disintegrate. The up and down quarks have rest masses of a few MeV, and that makes their ratio of minimum disintegration energy to rest mass about 10^6. That's right -- a million.
So for (disintegration energy) / (rest mass), I have this summary:
- Atoms: 10^(-8)
- Nuclei: 10^(-3)
- Hadrons: 1
- Quarks and leptons: >10^6
