Re: THE 'RADIUS' OF THE ELECTRON?

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#70

From: tadchem
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 2008 21:00

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On Jul 24, 6:12 pm, Loui...@edu.herlufsholm.dk wrote:
> Questions:
> - What is the value of the experimentally measured ’radius’ of the
> electron?
> - What is the value of the experimentally measured ’radius’ of the
> proton?
>
> Best regards
> Louis Nielsen
> Denmark

The "classical electron radius" is a claculated quantity, not a
measured one.  The calculation requires certain assumptions:

From
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_electron_radius

"In simple terms, the classical electron radius is roughly the size
the electron would need to have for its mass to be completely due to
its electrostatic potential energy - not taking quantum mechanics into
account. We now know that quantum mechanics, indeed quantum field
theory, is needed to understand the behavior of electrons at such
short distance scales, thus the classical electron radius is no longer
regarded as the actual size of an electron. In fact, modern particle
physics experiments indicate that the electron is a point particle,
i.e. it has no size and its radius is zero. "

IOW, "it is too small to measure".

Tom Davidson
Richmond, VA

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From: tadchem <tadchem@comcast.net>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.particle,sci.physics,dk.videnskab
Subject: Re: THE 'RADIUS' OF THE ELECTRON?
Date: Fri, 25 Jul 2008 14:00:25 -0700 (PDT)
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