Re: Not quite. - Edit 1
Before modification by jiggy at 17/06/2010 08:24:39 AM
In a way. The Higgs mechanism was originally developed to explain the masses of the W and Z bosons, and has since been extended to explain the fundamental fermion masses as well (leptons and quarks). It's not so much that the Higgs only couples to the weak force, but that the weak carrier bosons are the only bosons that couple to the Higgs.
Perhaps I wasn't clear. The Standard Model doublet consists of the three that get eaten, and the Higgs h. In the theoretical SUSY two-doublet model, a second doublet is added, which consists of H+, H-, H, and A. None of those are eaten, so that brings the total to 5.
Yeah, this is what I thought you were saying, but if you count the three 'eaten' Higgs' and the Higgs h, why then do you not count the H, H+, H- and A as separate particles, bringing the total to 8? It's ok, you don't have to answer that! I think I'll bow out of this discussion as particle is certainly not my area of expertise! I also liked how your reply to my first post "Not quite" really meant "Not at all!" it was very generous of you!
You could pick up Griffiths' Introduction to Elementary Particles if you want to learn more on your own. He does a good job with most of the Standard Model stuff, but there's not too much on beyond-SM topics (such as the supersymmetric concept we're discussing in this thread).
Got it already!
I don't think I'll have time to give it a good read until after I write up, but perhaps I'll be able to give it a look over in a few months. Thanks for bringing me a bit more up to date on the Higgs mechanism! 