HIGH ENERGY NUCLEAR PHYSICS

Academic Year 2018/2019 - 2° Year - Curriculum NUCLEAR AND PARTICLE PHYSICS
Teaching Staff: Francesco RIGGI
Credit Value: 6
Scientific field: FIS/04 - Nuclear and subnuclear physics
Taught classes: 42 hours
Term / Semester:

Learning Objectives

Learn the main experimental methods in data analysis for nuclear physics experiments


Course Structure

1) Lectures

2) NUmerical exercises


Detailed Course Content

Content of the course:

Introduction

Energetic regimes for nuclear collisions – Basic phenomenology for heavy ion nuclear collisions – The present status of the experimental facilities in high energy nuclear physics

 

Reconstruction of collision events

Kinematics of a nuclear collision – The low energy and light particle case – Three-body processes – Multibody collisions – Study of the final state – Kinematical variables in high energy nuclear and particle physics – Rapidity, pseudorapidity, transverse momentum and transverse mass – Transformation of variables – Kinematical acceptance - Reconstruction of decaying particles – Dalitz plots - Invariant mass spectra and identification of decaying particles – Armenteros-Podolanski plot - Background evaluation – Methods and algorithms for background subtraction in high multiplicity events - Event mixing techniques, track rotation, like-sign methods – Event generators for pp and heavy ion collisions – Use of event generators in nuclear physics - Event characterization – Centrality of collision events – Reaction plane and its determination.

 

High-energy nucleon-nucleon collisions

Basic phenomenology of Nucleon-Nucleon collisions – Particle production – Inclusive experimental distributions – Hard and soft processes – Event generators for nucleon-nucleon collisions – Examples from PITHYA event generator

 

Heavy ion collisions from intermediate to relativistic energy

Particle multiplicity – Energy density – Excitation energy – Central and peripheral collisions – Global variables - Event centrality determination – Nuclear matter at high density – Multifragmentation – Inclusive and exclusive experiments – Collective flow – Reaction plane – Subthreshold particle production – Phase transitions at intermediate energy – Particle production from intermediate to relativistic energies – Distributions and relative abundances – Rapidity and transverse momentum distributions – Inelasticity – Pion and kaon production – Strangeness production

 

Ultra-relativistic heavy ion collisions

Nuclear stopping – Energy density – Bjorken estimate – Geometrical description of nuclear collisions – Glauber model – Particle production – Collective effects – Hard probes – Jet quenching – Simulation of high energy nucleus-nucleus collisions – Event generators for heavy ion collisions – Examples from HIJING event generator

 

Hadronic matter and quark-gluon-plasma

QCD and QGP – The problem of quark deconfinement – Chiral symmetry – Quark matter – Search for experimental evidence of quark matter – Astrophysical aspects – Neutron stars – Strangelets – Links to cosmic ray physics

 

Signatures of QGP in heavy ion collisions

Dilepton production – Drell-Yann processes – J/Psi suppression – Strangeness production – Multistrange hyperons – Direct photon emission – Intensity interferometry and space-time size of nuclear sources – Event-by-event physics – Correlations and fluctuations

 

 

Recent results from high energy nuclear physics

Review of recent results at RHIC and LHC – Main results and perspectives – The upgrade of the LHC experiments and the future at LHC

 

Particle detectors in high energy nuclear physics

Particle detection in nuclear physics – General properties: operating strategies, signal information, calibration, energy, space and time resolution – Energy measurements – Timing measurements – Geometrical acceptance – Detector efficiency – Simulation techniques for the evaluation of acceptance and efficiency – Basic phenomenology of a nuclear collision - Charged particle multiplicity at low energy, intermediate energy and ultrarelativistic regimes – Individual detectors and multidetectors – Typical examples of multidetectors at intermediate energies – Examples of multidetectors at high energy - Tracking detectors - Vertex detectors – Detectors for particle identification.

 

Adavanced detection techniques

Recent developments in gas detectors – Drift chambers – Time Projection Chambers - Multigap resistive plate chambers – Development of silicon detectors – Microstrip detectors – Silicon drift detectors – Hybrid and monolithic pixel detectors – Silicon vertex detectors – Radiation damage in silicon detectors – Cerenkov Ring Detectors – Electromagnetic and hadronic calorimeters – Transition radiation Detectors - Scintillation detectors with wavelength shifter fibers – Development in photosensors: Avalanche photodiodes and Silicon photomultipliers.


Textbook Information

Specialized papers will be provided during the course