ELECTRON/POSITRON ANNIHILATION

When an electron and positron (antielectron) collide at high energy they can annihilate to produce D⁺ and D^- mesons (charm particles).

• Frame 1: The electron and positron zoom towards their certain doom.
• Frame 2: They collide and annihilate, releasing tremendous amounts of energy.
• Frame 3: The electron and positron have annihilated into a virtual photon, or a virtual Z particle, both of which are virtual forces carrier particles.
• Frame 4: A charm quark and a charm antiquark emerge from the virtual force carrier particle.
• Frame 5: They begin moving apart, stretching the color force field (gluon field) between them.

• Frame 6: The quarks move apart, further spreading their force field.
• Frame 7: The energy in the force field increase with the separation between the quarks. When there is sufficient energy in the force field, the energy is converted into a quark and an anti-quark (remember E=mc²).
• Frames 8-10: The quarks separate into distinct, colour-neutral particles: the D⁺ (a charm and anti-down quark) and D^- (an anti-charm and down quark) mesons.

The intermediate stages of this process occur in less than almost a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a second, and are not observable.

RESOURCES

ELECTRON/POSITRON ANNIHILATION - http://pdg.web.cern.ch/pdg/cpep/eedd.html

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