国际物理林匹克竞赛试题Theoretical_Exam_Solution_3_English.docVIP

Solution- Theoretical Question 3 Part A Neutrino Mass and Neutron Decay (a) Let , , and be the energy-momentum 4-vectors of the electron, the proton, and the anti-neutrino, respectively, in the rest frame of the neutron. Notice that are all in units of mass. The proton and the anti-neutrino may be considered as forming a system of total rest mass , total energy , and total momentum . Thus, we have , , (A1) Note that the magnitude of the vector is denoted as qc. The same convention also applies to all other vectors. Since energy and momentum are conserved in the neutron decay, we have (A2) (A3) When squared, the last equation leads to the following equality (A4) From Eq. (A4) and the third equality of Eq. (A1), we obtain (A5) With its second and third terms moved to the other side of the equality, Eq. (A5) may be divided by Eq. (A2) to give (A6) As a system of coupled linear equations, Eqs. (A2) and (A6) may be solved to give (A7) (A8) Using Eq. (A8), the last equality in Eq. (A4) may be rewritten as (A9) Eq. (A8) shows that a maximum of corresponds to a minimum of . Now the rest mass is the total energy of the proton and anti-neutrino pair in their center of mass (or momentum) frame so that it achieves the minimum (A10) when the proton and the anti-neutrino are both at rest in the center of mass frame. Hence, from Eqs. (A8) and (A10), the maximum energy of the electron E = c2Ee is (A11)* When Eq. (A10) holds, the proton and the anti-neutrino move with the same velocity vm of the center of mass and we have (A12) where the last equality follows from Eq. (A3). By Eqs. (A7) and (A9), the last expression in Eq. (A12) may be used to obtain the speed of the anti-neutrino when E = Emax. Thus, wit