Leptons and Photons

It is assumed that three lepton families (ν e , e), (ν µ , µ), (ν τ , τ) carry charges, which are sources of electronic, muonic and tauonic massless vector particles, respectively. Various manifestations of these hypothetical photons are discussed. We know only one photon that is coupled to the electric charge of particles. One of the most fundamental properties of the electric charge is its conservation. There exist three different leptonic quantum numbers: electronic for e, ν e , muonic for µ, ν µ , and tauonic for τ, ν τ , which at the present level of our ignorance are conserved. If they are strictly conserved they may serve as corresponding charges emitting and absorbing γ e , γ µ , γ τ – electronic, muonic and tauonic photons, respectively. These hypothetic charges and hypothetic photons and their possible manifestations are the subject of this letter. If neutrino oscillations are discovered experimentally, that will prove that the number of leptonic charges is reduced. Observation of transitions ν e ↔ ν µ ↔ ν τ would leave open only one window – that for the existence of total leptonic charge. In a similar manner observation of neutrinoless double beta decay (2n → 2e + 2p) would mean that electronic charge is definitely 1