Summer 2005 the HEPP Group Newsletter ISSUE 2: BURSTING WITH CHEERS & APPLAUSE! ANNUAL CONFERENCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK INSIDE THIS ISSUE 10TH TO 12TH APRIL 2006 We are proud to introduce a new addition to your newsletter: fter our 2005 Dublin meeting, we wish to thank all involved for A ‘Outreach Stories’ (on page 4). making it such a success - thanks! After the appointment of Anna Now it’s time to announce Starkey to the position of Outreach our 2006 Annual Conference. Officer for PPARC, we approached It will be hosted by the her about writing for us. Hopefully Elementary Particle Physics this will become a regular spot to Group at the University of showcase the marvelous work by Warwick. As another young people in our field to reach out to group (featuring some familiar the community and inform them faces) we are very happy to be about the world of high energy welcomed to Warwick. particle physics. So, if you are involved in outreach work, or have Closer to the date, further details of the conference will be posted at: been inspired by someone else’s project (including ‘Travels with a http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/physics/research/epp/iop06/ Spark Chamber’) please contact Anna at [email protected]. Perhaps we will be featuring you THE EUROPEAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY’S in an upcoming edition?! 2005 OUTREACH PRIZE Staying on the ‘outreach’ theme, has been awarded jointly to please join us in congratulating Peter Kalmus and Dave Barney on ave Barney for promoting his fascination of particle physics to the D being jointly awarded the EPS’s public, in parallel to his research work in the CMS collaboration at 2005 Outreach Prize. (See the CERN. His impressive and successful efforts are concentrated around feature opposite.) Well done, keep the CMS experiment, but also reach far beyond his own experiment. up the great work! & Remember our feature on the eter Kalmus for his long-standing and major personal involvement P HEPP Group Prize in our last in particle physics outreach. In the last years, he has given issue? Well, the 2005 winner was talks for schools and the public to a total audience Nick Jelley. He kindly agreed to of some 24000 in countries from the UK, Ireland and write an article on the physics of France to South Africa, Singapore and India. SNO, so turn to page 3 for a great Dave and Peter were presented with the award at a read by your Prize winner! ceremony in honour of the 2005 HEPP Prize winners What a wonderfully positive way th on 25 July in Lisbon. Congratulations! to begin an issue! Thanks! Editor: Professor Roger Barlow Assistant Editor: Christina Edgar To submit an article or to have your say in ‘Readers’ Letters’ please email [email protected] ~ 2 ~ the HEPP Group Newsletter Summer 2005 IOP COMMITTEE MEMBERSHIP THE COMMITTEE NEW MEMBERS Chairman Let your three newest committee members introduce themselves... Roger Barlow I’m Peter. I completed my D.Phil at Oxford under the The University of Manchester supervision of Mike Seymour and Herbi Dreiner in 2000. elected Chair April ‘02 After being a postdoc in Cambridge HEP group and a Honorary Secretary fellow in the CERN theory division, I was appointed as a lecturer at the IPPP, Durham, in 2003. My main research Gavin Davies Imperial College interest is the search for new physics at the Tevatron and elected April ‘03, Secretary ‘04 LHC and simulations of high energy collisions. Ex Officio I’m Tara, an RS university research fellow at the University of Liverpool. I work on the CDF experiment Peter Hobson Brunel University at Fermilab and the LHCb experiment, which will start taking data at CERN in 2007. Most of my work involves Andrew Morrison studying heavy quark production, with occasional PPARC Schools Liaison Officer excursions into electroweak and new physics. Student Representatives Hi Folks, I’m Nikos. I’ve been a lecturer at UCL since Gareth Brown 2002, working on ATLAS. My main activities are tracking University of Durham for the LVL2 Trigger and the event display program, elected April ‘04 atlantis. Before ATLAS, I was heavily involved in the James Loach Higgs searches in ALEPH. Understanding the origin of University of Oxford mass continues to be my favourite physics topic and I’m elected May ‘04 very much looking forward to the first LHC data, which Members are bound to shed light on this area! Vakhtang Kartvelishvili Lancaster University elected April ‘03 FUTURE PROGRAMME OF HALF-DAY MEETINGS Nikos Konstantinidis UPCOMING MEETINGS... University College London elected April ‘05 Tevatron Physics From the Tevatron to the LHC st Steve McMahon Imperial, 21 September ‘05 Manchester, Spring ‘06 Rutherford Appleton Laboratory Contact Gavin Davies Contact Vakhtang Kartvelishvili elected April ‘04 Theory for Experimentalists Careers in physics Peter Richardson Liverpool, 2nd November ‘05 Venue TBA, Spring ‘06 University of Durham Contact Christos Touramanis Contact Gavin Davies elected April ‘05 Statistics in HEP LHC first year physics Tara Shears Manchester, 16th November ‘05 Venue TBA, Summer ‘06 University of Liverpool Contact Contact elected April ‘05 Roger Barlow Tara Shears Christos Touramanis COMING IN THE FUTURE... Details to be confirmed... University of Liverpool CMB for beginners elected April ‘02 ...please consult the website! Linear Collider For further details on what’s happening at the Institute of Physics, please visit the website at http://groups.iop.org/HE the HEPP Group Newsletter ~ 3 ~ Summer 2005 THE THREE PHASES OF SNO Sudbury Neutrino Observatory into two protons and release an enabled SNO to make the most (SNO) was designed by scientists electron. Both reactions give direct and precise measurement from Canada, the US and the UK rise to characteristic Cerenkov of the total number of solar to detect neutrinos from the sun light, detected by SNO’s 10000 neutrinos (in excellent agreement using 1000 tonnes of heavy water. photomultiplier tubes. These with solar models). Significant Copious numbers of neutrinos are ‘PMT’s surround the heavy water, refinements to the oscillation produced in the fusion reactions itself contained in a 12m acrylic parameters describing neutrino that power the Sun. These ‘solar sphere. This, in turn, is surrounded mixing have also been made. neutrinos’ were first by 7000 tonnes of Results show that the smallest detected in 1967 light water to shield mass difference between the by Ray Davis, who against radioactivity. three neutrino types is ~0.01eV/c2, shared the 2003 Nobel SNO is located in and that the mixing is large. Prize for Physics Inco’s Creighton There are also indications that the for the discovery. nickel mine, 2km oscillations are enhanced as the Surprisingly, he underground to all neutrinos pass through the Sun, found only a third but eliminate cosmic an effect predicted by Mikheev, of the number of ray backgrounds. Smirnov and Wolfenstein in 1985. neutrinos expected. Crucial to the SNO is now in its third phase with This deficit, the ‘solar success of SNO 3He counters deployed to further neutrino problem’, was the cleanliness improve neutron detection. This may was confirmed by of its components. allow a better determination of the later experiments. In particular, total number of solar neutrinos and There are three radioactivity had would provide unique information known types of neutrino: electron-, to be reduced to exceedingly low about neutrinos generated inside muon- and tau-type. Gribov and levels. The fraction of natural supernovae, should one occur Pontecorvo suggested in 1969 that thorium in the heavy water had to within our galaxy. some of the electron-neutrinos be less than a few parts in 1015 - less SNO’s results have helped redefine were changing before they reached than one teaspoonful of rock dust our knowledge of neutrinos and Earth into another type of neutrino in 1000 tonnes of D2O! Such purity provided impetus for many new undetectable in Davis’ experiment. was needed to reduce the breaking experiments. Currently, physicists Using heavy water has a unique apart of deuterons by high energy are using high energy neutrino advantage (as Herb Chen pointed gamma-rays from this radioactivity beams, travelling several hundred to a small level compared to that kilometres between detectors, as out in 1985): D2O enables detection of all neutrino types. There are ten from solar neutrinos. well as intense beams of neutrinos thousand million neutrinos passing SNO’s results from this first from reactors, to extend our through an area the size of a postage phase provided strong evidence understanding of neutrino mixing. stamp every second. Even so, SNO that electron-neutrinos do indeed This may provide insights into sees only ten interactions per day. ‘oscillate’ to other neutrino-types. grand unification and help to explain Neutrinos of all types can The second phase of SNO was to the enormous mass differences, occasionally break a deuteron ‘add a pinch of salt’! Two tonnes spanning some thirteen orders of apart into its constituent proton of common table salt were added magnitude, that are seen between the fundamental particles. and neutron. Only electron- to the D2O to enhance the neutron neutrinos can change a deuteron detection efficiency. This has by Nick Jelley For more information on Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, please visit their website at http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca ~ 4 ~ the HEPP Group Newsletter Summer 2005 OUTREACH STORIES TRAVELS WITH A SPARK CHAMBER Human beings can be very Luckily, sixth formers enjoy to see first hand: acceleration quirky when it comes to travelling. helping to unload! of electrons and the avalanche There was a man who went round In the classroom, the speaker uses effect due to the strong electric Ireland with a fridge, and some the spark counter as the visual field between plates; total internal life-forms even choose to travel focus for an introduction to particle reflection of light in the channels through space and time with Billy physics, including a description of from the triggering scintillation Piper! Closer to home, a slightly his/her own research.