# physics terminology question: pronouncing superpartner names

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/physics-terminology-question-pronouncing-superpartner-names/270184>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 20, 2004, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/physics-terminology-question-pronouncing-superpartner-names/270184 "2004-10-20T06:39:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\
**Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/physics-terminology-question-pronouncing-superpartner-names/270184/1 "2004-10-20T06:39:10Z")

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OK, so I know the superpartners of quarks and leptons are called “squarks” and “sleptons”, respectively. And I’ve heard the same convention applied to specific particles, like the superpartner of the electron being called a “selectron” and the superpartner of the top being called a “stop.”

But how does this work for other particles? I’m most curious about the superpartner of the strange quark (since it already starts with an s), but it’s not obvious for some of the other quarks either. Would “scharm” be pronounced “sharm”, for example?

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**Author:** ![Punoqllads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@Punoqllads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Punoqllads)\
**Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/physics-terminology-question-pronouncing-superpartner-names/270184/2 "2004-10-20T08:11:45Z")

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> [@tim314](#):
>
> I’m most curious about the superpartner of the strange quark (since it already starts with an s)

Estranged quark?

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**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\
**Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/physics-terminology-question-pronouncing-superpartner-names/270184/3 "2004-10-20T12:56:44Z")

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The usual convention is to refer to a “charm squark” etc. - [an example](http://citebase.eprints.org/cgi-bin/citations?id=oai:arXiv.org:hep-ph/9712219).