Particle Physics
and the search
for the ultimate
building blocks
of matter
An Overview of the Center for Applied
Physics Studies
Prepared for the Louisiana Tech Energy
Systems Conference
5 Nov 2009
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Overview of CAPS
A Board of Regents recognized research center Faculty Associates:
 Greenwood, Sawyer, Wobisch
 Grimm, Johnston, Simicevic (dir.), Wells
 Genov
 Interdiscplinary projects in association with
 TTC (Allouche, Jaganathan)
 IfM (Wilson)
 LONI (Leangsuksun, Baggag)
 Sandi Perry – Administrative Assistant
 Sabine Fuchs – Lab Manager/Technician
 Michael Bryant – Systems Manager
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Nuclear Radiation Measurement
Laboratory
Dick Greenwood- Radiation Safety Officer
• Licensed by LA DEQ for radioactive material use
and storage
• Low Background Alpha-Beta Counting Facility
• Nuclear radiation spectroscopy
– Fast Nuclear Instrumentation Electronics
– NaI Spectrometer
– (2) Germanium High Precision Spectrometers
• Portable beta-gamma radiation detectors (radiacs)
• thermoluminescent dosimeter reader
• Oversight by the university BRIRC
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
CAPS Projects
•
Several Major Experimental Collaborations
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Detector Development Activities
•
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Gas Electron Multipliers (GEMs) for tracking
Nanoparticle implantation in scintillators
High speed trigger electronics
Advanced Computing Projects
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D0 Experiment at Fermi National Accelerator Lab
(Illinois)
ATLAS at CERN (Switzerland)
G0 and QWEAK Experiments at Jefferson
National Accelerator Lab (Virginia)
ILD and SiD Design Efforts for the Proposed
International Linear Collider
Data reconstruction and simulation on the GRID
Applications of GPGPUs to particle physics
experiments
FDTD simulation of fundamental & applied
physics processes
FDFD computational electrodynamics & modeling
of metamaterials
Interdisciplinary Activities
No. Publications
(Particle/Nuclear Only)
60
40
20
0
2004
2006
2008
2010
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
What Do Particle Physicists Do?
• We search for the most
elementary building
blocks of matter
• We study how those
pieces come to together
in more complicated
structures
• We study the
fundamental forces of
nature in particle
interactions
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
The New Periodic Table
Quarks group into larger structures,
like protons and neutrons
Electrons and their relatives
(muons, neutrinos,…) are
fundamental
Forces are mediated by another
set of fundamental particles
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
How do we know
these particles
exist?
How do we
produce them and
study them?
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Particle Accelerators
•
Accelerators allow us to explore the interactions of
particles at high energies
– See the underlying physics not the dressing
•
We can collide beams of either electrons or
protons
– Because electron beams radiate when accelerated,
proton accelerators are the best way to reach very
high energies
– But electron accelerators play an important
complementary role in making precision
measurements and to probe new physics via “higher
order” effects
•
Underlying
Event
Proton-antiproton collision:
g
d
u
u
q
q
d
u
u
Hard Scatter
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Fermi National
Accelerator
Laboratory
(“Fermilab”)
• About 50 miles west
of Chicago
• Named for Enrico
Fermi
• Currently the highest
energy particle
accelerator in the
world
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
The Dzero Experiment
• One of two large collider
detectors at Fermilab
• A five-story tall device with over 1
million channels of electronics
• Began current data taking run in
2001
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
The Next Frontier
• The Large Hadron
Collider (LHC)
– Due to start this year
– Proton-proton collision
from 10 to 14 TeV
– Also Nucleus-nucleus
collisions up to lead
• Four large detectors
– LATech is participating in
the ATLAS experiment
– Faculty, grad students,
and undergrad students
have spent significant
time at CERN
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Deconstructing a Detector:
ATLAS
A general purpose detector:
-Inner Tracking: Central and Forward
Pixels, Silicon Strip (SCT), and Transition
Radiation Tracker )TRT)
-- 2 T solenoid
-- EM liquid argon calorimeter
-- Hadronic scintialltor tile calorimeter
--Air-core superconducting toriods
-- Muon detectors (total area of 12,000 m2)
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
The Relation Between Discovery &
Application
•
The hardest job I have is
explaining the need for basic
research
• The best way to think of it as
“seed corn”
– You cannot have
applications in a generation
if you do not have the basic
science now
“One
sir, you may
– day,
The expenditures
on basic
tax it!”research are miniscule
compared to the future
economic benefit
• Or as Faraday said to Gladstone
when asked “Of what use is it?”
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
Nuclear Fission Timeline
1900
1910
1920
1930
1940
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
Nuclear Fusion Timeline
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics
A final Thought on Energy…
Chemical Reaction
Few eV/atom
Nuclear Reaction
MeV/nucleon
Quark – Gluon Reactions
Few GeV/parton
Dr. Lee Sawyer
Charles & Nelwyn Spruell Endowed Professor of
Physics