A Gauge Theory for the Weak and Electromagnetic Interactions

Abstract

In this chapter we develop the Glashow–Weinberg–Salam theory of electromagnetic and weak interactions based on the gauge group SU(2) × U(1). We show that the apparent difference in strength between the two interactions is due to the Brout–Englert–Higgs phenomenon which results in heavy intermediate vector bosons. The model is presented first for the leptons, and then we argue that the extension to hadrons requires the introduction of a fourth quark. We show that the GIM mechanism guarantees the natural suppression of strangeness changing neutral currents. In the same spirit, the need to introduce a natural source of CP-violation leads to a six quark model with the Cabibbo–Kobayashi–Maskawa mass matrix.