three
Remember the quarks from the first page of this chapter? Quarks are even tinier particles of matter that make up protons and neutrons. There are three quarks in each proton and three quarks in each neutron. The charges of quarks are balanced exactly right to give a positive charge to a proton and a neutral charge to a neutron. It might seem strange that quarks are never found alone but only as components of other particles. This is because the quarks are held together by very strange particles called gluons.