Each basic lepton carries a unit of a "charge" that is conserved in all interactions involving that lepton. The positron is assigned one unit of q-charge, which is simply the electrostatic charge normally associated with the positron. The n_e, n_m, and n_t are each assigned a unit of metacharge (m-charge), s-charge and c-charge, respectively. The antileptons are each assigned a negative unit of the respective charge. The choice is somewhat arbitrary as to which particle of a given type is the lepton and which is the antilepton. However, the symmetries are much more easily presented with the proposed assignments.

More complex particles can be thought of as seething cauldrons in which lepton-antilepton pairs are constantly being created and annihilated by the binding force. More massive particles can be thought of as bindings of greater numbers of basic leptons. From the simple bindings described above, it would appear that the bound n_m and n_t are increasingly heavier than the bound n_e. That is, they contribute increasingly more to the mass of the particles in which they are bound. Because they are fermions, bindings of larger numbers of basic leptons and antileptons would necessarily contain leptons and antileptons of a particular type (charge) at increasingly higher, more massive levels. Only certain kinds of bindings are possible. Most leptons and antileptons will be bound in balanced pairs that contribute no net charge of that type. Generally, the excess "charge" of any given type in a binding cannot be too large. For example, too much excess q-charge in a binding would result in an electrostatic repulsion that would reduce the stability of that binding.

Mesons are proposed as bindings containing an even number of basic leptons and antileptons with a net "charge" excess or deficiency of zero across all four types. Complex leptons and baryons with a baryon number of one are bindings of an odd number of basic leptons and antileptons with an aggregate lepton-antilepton excess of 1 and -1, respectively, across all four charge types.

In a collision between two particles, the kinetic energy of the collision can be converted into additional lepton-antilepton pairs. During a collision, most of the resulting leptons will rebind into metastable particles. Decays of metastable particles will result from subsequent rebinding into lighter metastable particles, accompanied by pair annihilations and creations until only basic leptons, photons and protons are left. A proton is simply an extremely stable binding of basic leptons, sort of a black hole, from which nothing can escape. It has, among other excesses, exactly one positron excess. Consequently it has the same electrostatic charge as a positron. Even in the "weak" interaction, q-charge is known to be conserved. In "strong" interactions, it will be shown that the other charges are also strictly conserved as well.

The "weak" interaction can simply be described as one which has in its decay products, in addition to the complex metastable bindings, a free lepton and a free antilepton of differing charge types. When the free lepton and anti-lepton are both neutrinos, they appear to vanish. This disappearance might be effected in one of two ways. One possibility is that they are so light that they might carry away as much (or as little) energy and momentum as is needed to maintain conservation of energy in a multiparticle interaction. Although free neutrinos also interact so weakly as to go undetected, especially if they are not very energetic, it is unlikely, however, that none would ever be detected. It is more likely that one of the neutrinos (or antineutrinos) first changes type, after which it may either annihilate with an excess antineutrino (neutrino) of the same type or become an excess netutrino itself. In either case the result is unstable so that decay of the complex particle would necessarily result. This effect will become apparent as the particles are characterized and Table IV is examined. In all of these cases the proposed reaction shows both missing leptons together, in parentheses.

As noted, a challenge to physics will be to determine the actual bindings that constitute the various particles. Without actually stating the number of leptons that might actually constitute any particular particle, however, it is proposed that each particle can be simply characterized by the charge excess due to each particular lepton type. From the standpoint of a shorthand notation, particles can be characterized by these excesses in the form (qmsc). Different bindings containing differing numbers of leptons but with the same charge excesses would have the same (qmsc) characterization, but would generally be considered different particles. The "charge" excesses of the four types (qmsc) above or below balanced lepton-antilepton pairs, bound in complex particles, map onto conserved properties of the known mesons and baryons.

For any particular particle, it is proposed that the I₃ component of isospin is simply related to proposed leptonic charge excesses by Equation 1. It is proposed that the baryon number A of a particle is simply related to proposed leptonic charge excesses by Equation 2. It is also proposed that the properties normally assigned to the quarks of the standard model are also merely properties resulting from linear combinations of the leptonic charge excesses of the respective particles. In this respect, the uphishness (U), downishness (D), antistrangeness (S) and charm (C) of a particle can be related to the lepton excesses by Equation 3.