Q-ball

English

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Etymology 1

Q (“charge”) +‎ ball, coined by physicist Sidney Coleman. In physics, charge is often represented by the letter Q, and the soliton is spherically symmetric.

Noun

Q-ball (plural Q-balls)

1. A charged soliton that represents the lowest possible energy state of its components and is therefore stable.
   • 2001, Tuomas Multamäki, “Q-ball Collisions in the MSSM”, in Strong and Electroweak Matter 2000, page 348:

     Q-ball collisions are studied numerically on a two dimensional lattice for a range of Q-ball charges.

   • 2008, Roger Ebert, Roger Ebert's Movie Yearbook 2009, page 880:

     If you're going to fly inside Mercury's orbit and hurl a bomb into the sun to burst its Q-ball (non-topological soliton) into pieces, I suggest that home may require a theoretical solution.

   • 2009, Noah Graham, Markus Quandt, Herbert Weigel, Specral Methods in Quantum Field Theory, page 171:

     A complex scalar theory in three dimensions with a cubic coupling can support classically stable, time-dependent, non-topological solutions to the equations of motion that carry a global charge Q, called Q-balls.

Etymology 2

Noun

Q-ball

1. (slang) An illicit drug made up from quetiapine and cocaine.