The quark model and asymptotic freedom

The authors stress that it is not their task to provide a detailed account of the quark model (this is given in many monographs and reviews). This chapter is merely a prolog to the complex contemporary problems of high-energy physics which form the main subject of the present monograph. The quark model is based on the idea that there exist hypothetical fundamental particles - quarks, which they shall denote by q-bar/sub i/ (the index i characterizes the type of quark). From these particles and their antiparticles one constructs bound states, which are identified with the known hadrons. It turns out that all the observed mesons can be constructed from a quark q/sub i/ and an antiquark q-bar/sub i/, while the baryons (antibaryons) can be constructed from three quarks (antiquarks). To make it possible to build up all the observed hadrons and their characteristics, the authors must postulate that the quarks (antiquarks) possess the following properties: 1) spin 1/2; 2) isospin. It is necessary to introduce isospin 1/2 for the construction of the nonstrange hadrons. It has been proposed to denote the quark with isospin projection tau/sub 3/ = 1/2 by the symbol u (from the English ''up'') and the quark with isospin projection tau/sub 3/ = -1/2 by the symbol d (from the English ''down'')