THE NEUTRINO

The Neutrino is a Chargeless, nearly massless, lepton. It was first proposed as a theoretical particle in the 1930's by Wolfgang Pauli. Pauli's work on negative Beta decay is what lead to the theorising of the Neutrino. Beta decay at this point was assumed to be the decay of a Neutron to a Proton and an Electron. However, when the energy of Beta decay was found and the momentum of the decay was found, there was a difference between expected values and experimental values. This meant that the equation:

N → P + e-

Is incomplete. Pauli proposed that a particle of no charge and almost no mass existed, which carried all the energy and momentum of the reaction. This was the Neutrino:

Despite being "found" in the 1930's, it took until 1956 when the neutrino was first observed.