An empirical approach to the theory of particle and nuclear phenomena: Review and some new ideas

Experimental data on masses and lifetimes of unstable particles falls into a pattern, a brief review of some interesting consequences is presented here. From the experience in semiclassical methods and recent advances in quantum chromodynamics, it is proposed that an appropriate generalization of the Gutzwiller trace formula for field theories may lead to a systematic semiclassical chromodynamics theory. The theory can be developed to get appropriate dynamics leading to an explanation of pattern discovered in the empirical data.