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Why do neutrons have magnetic moments with spin?

Physics Asked on January 21, 2021

Neutrons are neutrally charged, but apparently they have magnetic moments with spin.

What is the intuition behind this?

One Answer

A neutron is a composite particle consisting of three pointlike quarks. These carry fractional electric charge which adds up to zero, so the neutron has no net charge. But since the quarks do carry nonzero charges, if they are spinning around inside the neutron then it is possible for the neutron to possess a magnetic moment while not possessing a net charge.

The fact that the neutron has a nonzero magnetic moment despite having no net charge while also possessing a well-defined radius were clues that it had internal structure (the quarks), which was proven in the deep inelastic scattering experiments done at SLAC in the late 1960's.

Correct answer by niels nielsen on January 21, 2021

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