A Level Physics PowerPoint Presentation | Stability of the proton
Decay of the Proton
A free proton (one outside a nucleus) has long been considered to be a stable particle, but recent developments of grand unification models have suggested that it might decay with a half-life of about 1031 years.
Particle Physicists are trying to prove that this is indeed the case.
The decay of the proton is associated with a quark transformation in which an "up" quark is converted to a "down" quark by the weak interaction .