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
W′ and Z′ bosons W′ and Z′ bosons In particle physics, W′ and Z′ bosons (or W-prime and Z-prime bosons) refer to hypothetical gauge bosons that arise from extensions of the electroweak symmetry of the Standard Model. They are named in analogy with the Standard Model W and Z bosons. W′ bosons often arise in models with an extra SU(2) gauge group. is spontaneously broken to the diagonal subgroup SU(2) which corresponds to the electroweak SU(2). More generally, we might have "n" copies of SU(2), which are then broken down to a diagonal SU(2). This gives rise to "n"−1 W′, W′ and Z′ bosons.