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Chemistry and Physics - What Are The Subatomic Particles?
What are the subatomic particles?
Subatomic particles are particles that are smaller than atoms. Historically, only electrons (negatively charged particles), protons (positively charged particles), and neutrons (particles with no charge) were considered to be subatomic particles. However, the definition of subatomic particles has now been expanded to include elementary particles—particles that are less complex than an atom, and are believed to be indivisible (can't be broken down into smaller parts). The study of elementary particles has only become possible over the last half of this century, with the development of increasingly sophisticated instruments.
There have been various systems proposed for categorizing elementary particles—for instance, by the way they spin, their mass, or their common properties. One system, commonly known as the Standard Model, places all elementary particles into two groups: leptons...
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