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PHYS311 : Particle Physics

Year:12/13
Department:Physics
Level:Part II (yr 3)
Learning Hours:150
Credit Points:15
Weight:0.5
Course Convenor:Dr H Fox
Status:Live

Assessment Rules

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  • 80% Exam
  • 20% Coursework

CMod description

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Symmetries, Quark model, colour, introduction to QCD. Leptons. Forces and their carrier particles. Feynman diagrams.

Curriculum Design: Outline Syllabus

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Revision of Special Relativity 4-vector manipulation, center-of-mass energy calculations, boosts Quarks and Lepton Standard Model, Fermions & Bosons, Particles & Anti Particles, Free Particle Wave Equation, Helicity States, Quark & Lepton Flavours Interactions & Fields Feynman Diagrams, Electromagnetic Interaction, Strong Interaction, Electroweak Interaction, Interaction Cross-section, Decays & Resonances Accelerators & Detectors accelerator operations, Interactions of particles with matter, Basic detector elements: ionisation chamber, proportional counter and gas amplification, scintillators and photomultipliers, Devices for position and momentum measurements, Particle identification systems, Electromagnetic and hadronic calorimeters, Muon systems, Modern large multipurpose detector systems for experiments in Particle Physics. Invariance Principles and Conservation Laws Parity, Parity of pions, particles, & antiparticles, Charge conjugation, Baryon & Lepton Conservation Quark Model Baryon Decuplet, Baryon Octet, Light Pseudo-Scalar Mesons, Vector Mesons, tests of the Quark Model Lepton and Quark Scattering e+e to mu+mu , e+e to hadrons, electron-muon scattering, neutrino-electron scattering, deep inelastic scattering QCD Color Quantum Number, QCD at short and long distances, jets, running couplings Weak Interactions Lepton Universality, Helicity if the neutrino, V A, Weak. Currents, Pion and muon decays,Weak decays of quarks, the GIM model and CKMmatrix, neutral kaons Electroweak Interactions Neutral Currents, Intermediate Vector Bosons, Couplings of Quarks and Leptons, Neutrino Scattering, Total and Partial Widths of the Z, Higgs Mechanism Beyond the Standard Model Supersymmetry, Neutrino Oscillations.

 

Educational Aims: Subject Specific: Knowledge, Understanding and Skills

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The module aims to provide a general introduction to theoretical and experimental topics in elementary particle physics, essentially the Standard Model of particle physics.

 

Learning Outcomes: Subject Specific: Knowledge, Understanding and Skills

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Knowledge and Understanding: on successful completion of the module students should be able to

(i) describe the main features of the Standard Model of particle physics and understand its place in physics as a whole;
(ii) describe major pieces of experimental evidence supporting the key theoretical ideas, including the experimental techniques used (accelerators and detectors);
(iii) understand the role of symmetry and conservation laws in fundamental physics;

Skills: on successful completion of the module students should be able to

(i) perform simple calculations of physically observable quantities relevant to the subject;
(ii) solve problems based on the application of the general principles of particle physics, e.g. use conservation laws to explain whether specific particle reactions and decays are allowed or forbidden;

 

Curriculum Design: Select Bibliography

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(E) W S C Williams, Nuclear and Particle Physics, Clarendon Press

(R) D H Perkins, Introduction to High Energy Physics 4th Edition, CUP

(R) D J Griffiths, Introduction to Elementary Particles, Wiley.

Lancaster University
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LancasterLA1 4YW United Kingdom
+44 (0) 1524 65201