Question

What are quarks and hadrons inside an atom

Answer 1

The nucleus of an atom normally contains two types of particle: the proton and the neutron. From what you have learned before, it may seem that protons and neutrons are fundamental particles. This would be a nice simple picture of matter: three particles that make up the Universe - protons, neutrons and electrons. However, protons and neutrons are only two particles in a large family called hadrons. Unlike the electron, hadrons are not fundamental - they are made up of even smaller particles called quarks.