How does beta-decay of neutron follow the law of conservation of electric charge?
Beta particles are electrons or positrons (electrons with positive electric charge, or antielectrons). Beta decay occurs when, in a nucleus with too many protons or too many neutrons, one of the protons or neutrons is transformed into the other. In beta minus decay, a neutron decays into a proton. Electric charge conservation requires that if an electrically neutral neutron becomes a positively charged proton, an electrically negative particle (in this case, an electron) must also be produced. So the charge is not conserved so an electron is also emitted as beta particle along with the proton thus the charge becomes conserved. It is observed that the momentum and energy is not still conserved. So Fermi suggested and developed a theory of beta decay in which the antineutrino carried away the missing energy and momentum, with no charge and almost no mass.
