Research Themes |
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Subatomic Physics
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The goal of subatomic physics is to understand the nature of matter at the most fundamental level, more specifically to identify the basic constituents of matter and to understand their properties and interactions. This is done at two size scales which define two broad sub-fields: "nuclear physics" is the study of the atomic nucleus, while "particle physics" focusses on the most elementary, sub-nuclear level.
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Faculty Involved |
Mike Vetterli |
Magnetic Resonance
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Research activity in this area ranges from applications of solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) to the use of advanced techniques including muon spin rotation/relaxation/resonance (µSR), beta-decay NMR (ßNMR), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of hyperpolarized noble gases. |
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Faculty Involved |
Mike Hayden |
Jeff Sonier |
The ALPHA
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ALPHA will pick up where ATHENA left off. This means that the ALPHA apparatus is a natural evolution from the ATHENA apparatus. In ATHENA the antihydrogen atoms were allowed to drift to the wall of the trap to annihilate and the focus was on learning more about how to optimise the formation rate as well as how to influence the temperature and final state of the produced antihydrogen. In ALPHA the focus will be on trapping the antihydrogen atoms and once that has been achieved to do spectroscopy on the trapped atoms. Trapping the neutral antihydrogen atoms puts a lot of constraints on our experimental setup. |
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Faculty Involved |
Mike Hayden |
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Superconductivity
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Superconductivity was discovered by Kamerlingh Onnes in mercury at 4.2 K; today it is observed in a variety of materials, including copper oxides, bucky balls, even plastic, and in some cases at more than a third of room temperature |
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Faculty Involved |
Jeff Sonier |
High Energy Particle and Field Theory
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The study of the elementary constituents of matter and their interactions has been transformed by a series of revolutionary theoretical and experimental discoveries. |
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Faculty Involved |
Howard Trottier
Dugan O'Neil |
ALTAS-The Particle Physics
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The ALTAS is a particle detector which has been built and is managed by scientists in 37 countries around the world. Its purpose is to record the debris from proton-proton collisions at the LHC. The SFU group is involved in building part of the world-wide computing grid needed to analyze ATLAS data (more than 3 petabytes per year!). We are also involved in testing, commissioning and calibrating the detector. Finally, we will be using the data to look for exciting "new physics"! |
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Faculty Involved |
Dugan O'Neil |
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