WHAT IS A TRULY NEUTRAL PARTICLE?

Abstract

An electrically charged particle is necessarily different from its antiparticle while an electrically neutral particle is either identical with or different from its antiparticle. A truly neutral particle is a particle identical to its antiparticle, which means that all its algebraic intrinsic properties are equal to zero since particle and antiparticle have all their algebraic intrinsic properties opposite. We propose two complementary methods to recognize the true nature of any electrically neutral particle. On the one hand, any non-null algebraic intrinsic property of a particle (properties such as Q, magnetic moment already known from classical physics, or quantum numbers such as baryonic number A, lepton number L or flavors, which are meaningful only in the quantum world) reveals that it is distinct from its antiparticle. On the other hand, any particle decaying through a self-conjugate channel or/and through both two conjugate channels is a truly neutral particle implying then that all algebraic intrinsic properties, known or yet unknown, of this particle are null. According to these methods, the neutrino, like any fermion, cannot be its own antiparticle, so neutrinoless double beta decay cannot take place in nature. We point out the internal contradiction required by the existence of hypothetical neutrinoless double beta decay. We suggest that persistent failure to find experimental evidence for this decay mechanism despite huge efforts dedicated to this aim is consistent with the physics of this process. The immediate consequence would be that limits of neutrino mass deduced from neutrinoless double beta decay cannot be used as constraints in contrast with mass limits deduced from the behavior of the end-point in simple beta spectra.