Force force. Here the strong force acts indirectly, transmitted as gluons, which form part of the virtual pi and rho mesons, which classically transmit the nuclear force (see this topic for more). The failure of many searches for free quarks has shown that the elementary particles affected are not directly observable. This phenomenon is called color confinement. The weak force is due to the exchange of the heavy W and Z bosons. Its most familiar effect is beta decay (of neutrons in atomic nuclei) and the associated radioactivity. The word "weak" derives from the fact that the field strength is some
Elementary particle one can conclude that most of the visible mass of the universe consists of protons and neutrons, which, like all baryons, in turn consist of up quarks and down quarks. Some estimates imply that there are roughly baryons (almost entirely protons and neutrons) in the observable universe. The number of protons in the observable universe is called the Eddington number. In terms of number of particles, some estimates imply that nearly all the matter, excluding dark matter, occurs in neutrinos, and that roughly elementary particles of matter exist in the visible universe, mostly neutrinos. Other estimates imply that roughly elementary