Identical particles fermions, which do not share quantum states as described by the Pauli exclusion principle. Examples of bosons are photons, gluons, phonons, helium-4 nuclei and all mesons. Examples of fermions are electrons, neutrinos, quarks, protons, neutrons, and helium-3 nuclei. The fact that particles can be identical has important consequences in statistical mechanics. Calculations in statistical mechanics rely on probabilistic arguments, which are sensitive to whether or not the objects being studied are identical. As a result, identical particles exhibit markedly different statistical behaviour from distinguishable particles. For example, the indistinguishability of particles has been proposed as a solution to Gibbs' mixing
Introduction to gauge theory particles are called gauge bosons, where the term "boson" refers to a particle with integer spin. In the simplest versions of the theory, gauge bosons are massless, but it is also possible to construct versions in which they have mass, as is the case for the gauge bosons that transmit the nuclear decay forces. These books are intended for general readers and employ the barest minimum of mathematics. Introduction to gauge theory A gauge theory is a type of theory in physics. The word gauge means a measurement, a thickness, an in-between distance, (as in railroad tracks) or a resulting