QUARK

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does quark mean? 

• QUARK (noun)
  The noun QUARK has 2 senses:

1. (physics) hypothetical truly fundamental particle in mesons and baryons; there are supposed to be six flavors of quarks (and their antiquarks), which come in pairs; each has an electric charge of +2/3 or -1/3

2. fresh unripened cheese of a smooth texture made from pasteurized milk, a starter, and rennet

  Familiarity information: QUARK used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• QUARK (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

(physics) hypothetical truly fundamental particle in mesons and baryons; there are supposed to be six flavors of quarks (and their antiquarks), which come in pairs; each has an electric charge of +2/3 or -1/3

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)

Context example:

quarks have not been observed directly but theoretical predictions based on their existence have been confirmed experimentally

Hypernyms ("quark" is a kind of...):

elementary particle; fundamental particle ((physics) a particle that is less complex than an atom; regarded as constituents of all matter)

Domain category:

natural philosophy; physics (the science of matter and energy and their interactions)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "quark"):

beauty quark; bottom quark (a quark with a charge of -1/3 and a mass about 10,000 times that of an electron)

charm quark (a quark with an electric charge of +2/3 and a mass 2900 times that of an electron and a charm of +1)

down quark (a stable quark with an electric charge of -1/3 and a mass 607 times that of an electron)

squark; strange quark (a quark with an electric charge of -1/3 and a mass 988 times that of an electron and a strangeness of -1)

top quark; truth quark (a hypothetical quark with a charge of +2/3 and a mass more than 100,000 times that of an electron)

up quark (a stable quark with an electric charge of +2/3 and a mass 607 times that of an electron)

Holonyms ("quark" is a part of...):

hadron (any elementary particle that interacts strongly with other particles)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Fresh unripened cheese of a smooth texture made from pasteurized milk, a starter, and rennet

Classified under:

Nouns denoting foods and drinks

Synonyms:

quark; quark cheese

Hypernyms ("quark" is a kind of...):

cheese (a solid food prepared from the pressed curd of milk)

 Context examples 

But quarks are even smaller particles—the building blocks of protons, neutrons and other subatomic particles known as baryons.

(Physicists discover long-sought 'pentaquark' particle, NSF)

Baryons, including protons and neutrons, are composed of three quarks.

(Physicists discover long-sought 'pentaquark' particle, NSF)

It represents a way to aggregate quarks, namely the fundamental constituents of ordinary protons and neutrons, in a pattern that has never been observed before in over fifty years of experimental searches.

(Physicists discover long-sought 'pentaquark' particle, NSF)

A pentaquark is something different—a "composite state" that groups four quarks and one antiquark, the associated antimatter particle for a quark.

(Physicists discover long-sought 'pentaquark' particle, NSF)

The discovery was made by the CERN Large Hadron Collider b-quark (LHCb) experiment group, one of several ongoing particle physics experiments at the laboratory.

(Physicists discover long-sought 'pentaquark' particle, NSF)