Synopses & Reviews
The book provides theoretical and phenomenological insights on the structure of matter, presenting concepts and features of elementary particle physics and fundamental aspects of nuclear physics. Starting with the basics (nomenclature, classification, acceleration techniques, detection of elementary particles), the properties of fundamental interactions (electromagnetic, weak and strong) are introduced with a mathematical formalism suited to undergraduate students. Some experimental results (the discovery of neutral currents and of the W± and Z0 bosons; the quark structure observed using deep inelastic scattering experiments) show the necessity of an evolution of the formalism. This motivates a more detailed description of the weak and strong interactions, of the Standard Model of the microcosm with its experimental tests, and of the Higgs mechanism. The open problems in the Standard Model of the microcosm and macrocosm are presented at the end of the book. For example, the CP violation currently measured does not explain the matter-antimatter asymmetry of the observable universe; the neutrino oscillations and the estimated amount of cosmological dark matter seem to require new physics beyond the Standard Model. A list of other introductory texts, work reviews and some specialized publications is reported in the bibliography. Translation from the Italian Language Edition "Particelle e interazioni fondamentali" by Sylvie Braibant, Giorgio Giacomelli, and Maurizio Spurio Copyright © Springer-Verlag Italia, 2009 Springer-Verlag Italia is part of Springer Science+Business Media All Rights Reserved
Synopsis
This book aims to provide the basis of theoretical and phenomenological knowledge of the structure of matter at the subatomic level.Organized in such a way that it can be used by undergraduate students specialized either in particle or nuclear physics, it starts by presenting the general concepts at the simplest level which does not require previous knowledge of the field, except for the basic quantum mechanics. The students are gradually guided towards the more advanced arguments presented in Chapters 9 to 13, generally addressed to graduate and PhD students in experimental high-energy physics.
A special emphasis is
Synopsis
Based on the celebrated lectures of the influential particle physicist Giorgio Giacomelli, this volume, now in a new edition, aims to provide the basic theoretical foundations, and phenomenological knowledge of, the structure of matter at the subatomic level.
About the Author
Giorgio M. Giacomelli became full professor of Physics in 1971. He is (co)author of > 650 publications in scientific journals and over 350 reports and conference proceedings. He supervised 115 Laurea Theses, 30 PhD Theses.
Table of Contents
Preface
1 Historical Notes and Fundamental Concepts
2 Particle Interactions with Matter and Detectors
3 Particle Accelerators and Particle Detection
4 The Paradigm of Interactions: the Electromagnetic Case
5 First