Bootstrap theory of octet enhancement

Recently it has become apparent that many violations of SU(3) follow an octet pattern. For example, (i) the Gell-Mann-Okubo sum rule(1,2) represents the main features of strong mass splittings among members of a supermultiplet, indicating that the splittings transform like the eighth component of an octet; (ii) the electromagnetic mass splittings within the baryon isospin multiplets seem to transform mostly like the third component of an octet3; (iii) nonleptonic weak decays also seem to be dominantly octet in view of the |ΔI|=½ rule.(4