| Re: An Idea
Good question Dipayankar and I'm still looking, I believe both point particles and strings are still theoretical. I did find this in the meantime however.
Strings vs. Point Particles
The main distinction between strings and point particles is the fact that strings have spatial extent, whereas point particles are literally zero-dimensional. It had previously been supposed by physicists formulating quantum mechanics that the elementary particles were points. However, string theory states that the elementary particles are not points but instead are tiny undulating strings. According to the uncertainty principle, the ability of a particle to "probe" an area depends on its quantum wavelength, or the amount of uncertainty in its position - in other words, a particle's sensitivity becomes "blurred" by quantum jitters. As you will see, this proves to be important in the unification of quantum mechanics and string theory.
Best,
Pat |