👉 Heavy-light particles, or axions, are hypothetical elementary particles that have been proposed as candidates for dark matter, the mysterious substance thought to make up about 27% of the universe's mass-energy content. Unlike heavier particles like electrons or protons, axions are extremely light and interact very weakly with ordinary matter, making them difficult to detect. These particles are theorized to have been produced in the early universe, shortly after the Big Bang, through a process known as the Peccei-Quinn symmetry breaking. This mechanism predicts the existence of a new type of force carrier, distinct from the electromagnetic and weak nuclear forces, which axions would mediate. The search for heavy-light particles is a significant area of research in particle physics, driven by both theoretical interest in explaining dark matter and experimental efforts to detect these elusive particles using sophisticated detectors and experiments like ADMX (Axion Dark Matter eXperiment).
