# Metadata Source URL:: https://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/the-particle-physics-of-you --- # The particle physics of you Not only are we made of fundamental particles, we also produce them and are constantly bombarded by them throughout the day. ## Highlights > [!quote]+ Updated on 240822_144331 > > Your body is a small-scale mine of radioactive particles. You receive an annual 40-millirem dose from the natural radioactivity originating inside of you. That’s the same amount of radiation you’d be exposed to from having four chest X-rays. Your radiation dose level can go up by one or two millirem for every eight hours you spend sleeping next to your similarly radioactive loved one. > [!quote]+ Updated on 240822_144340 > > When Potassium-40 decays, it releases a positron, the electron’s antimatter twin, so you also contain a small amount of antimatter. The average human produces more than 4000 positrons per day, about 180 per hour. But it’s not long before these positrons bump into your electrons and annihilate into radiation in the form of gamma rays.