I was reading a magazine that mentioned an elementary particle called a Kaon which had the property to be able to change into it's own anti-particle and back again.

 

This same magazine also had a table of all the elementary particles and the Kaon wasn't listed on it.

 

So what's the story with the Kaon - apart from it having a REALLY cool name?

A kaon is a particular bound state of a quark and anti-quark, one of which must be a 'strange' quark. It is not a fundamental particle.

 

There are different kaons, depending on which quarks are inside. For example K⁰ is a bound state of a down quark with a strange anti-quark, while K⁺ is an up quark with a strange anti-quark.

 

They are rather interesting because their interactions do not conserve CP.

Could you give us some more info on it?

I know a bit about kaons.

 

For example there are only 4 types of kaons (kaons are mesons):

1) K0 (down quark & strange anti-quark)

2) Anti K0 (therefore it contains a strange quark & a down anti-quark)

3) K- (strange quark & up antiquark)

4) K+ (antiparticle of a K- so contains an up quark & a strange anti-quark)

 

These 4 different kaons (which you could count as 2, each with their own anti kaon) exist because they each have a different strangeness (S). S is a quantum number and is worked out by:

S = [number of strange anti-quarks] - [number of strange quarks]

 

Basically kaons have a lot to do with strange quarks, indeed a kaon must contain either a strange quark or a strange anti-quark.