Dear Dean,

There’s a pencil lying on my desk right now. It’s not much to look at, but what if I could zoom way in and see the protons and other itty-bitty stuff inside it?

My friend Ryan Corbin told me it would be like looking at a bubbling soup of fundamental particles. He’s a quantum physicist at Washington State University.

He told me that protons—along with neutrons—form the nucleus in the middle of an atom.

“Atoms make up all the stuff that we see,” Corbin said. “An atom has neutrons and protons in its nucleus. Protons have a positive electric charge. Neutrons … » More …