WOW! I am at the moment sitting on my couch reviewing the photos of the last three weeks and I am in awe, mainly, with all the amazing people I have met. This fantastic opportunity to experience lectures in particle physics, accelerators and detectors was, in some ways, overshadowed by the amazing teachers I have met. Their commitment and experiences have taught me so much and I am thankful for their laughter, support and general good times had.
I am overwhelmed at the amazing work people at CERN do. If I could make only one statement about the High School Teachers Program, I would say make sure you apply, and make sure you go. It is a life changing experience, not just for you, but for all the students you will be teaching after your experience.
If you have any questions, or require any information, please don't hesitate to contact me.
Take care,
Juliana
LHC Control Button
press in case of emergency
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Friday, July 10, 2009
The Scientists of CERN
So far the teacher's project I am working on is going well. We started the day with our first lecture in Cosmology and then we sat in on the second part of Rolf Landua's lecture on Antimatter. After lunch we all got stuck into our projects and 4 hours later, there is still not a person to be seen out on the terrace enjoying the evening. The dedication is really something to marvel at, as all the teachers here are either on their summer holidays, or winter holidays. The amount of work going into the projects means that we will all have something useful to take back and share with our students and communities about CERN and Physics.
Tomorrow we continue to interview prominent female scientists for our project, take our final lecture on cosmology and check out the medical applications of the research that is and has taken place through nuclear physics.
Tomorrow we continue to interview prominent female scientists for our project, take our final lecture on cosmology and check out the medical applications of the research that is and has taken place through nuclear physics.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Nobel Prize Winners and Teacher Working Groups
Yesterday afternoon's lecture from the winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics, Steven Weinberg, was amazing. The Globe of Science and Innovation (the venue for the talk) was so full that people were being turned back and weren't allowed in. Admittedly I was not very familiar with the subject content of the lecture, but to be in the presence of such an interesting Physics speaker was amazing. He weaved a story through his lecture and it was really a moment I won't forget. CERN is just an unbelievable place.
This week has seen the start of our working groups on teacher projects. I have decided to interview female physicists that work at CERN and come up with some classroom activities to promote the amazing opportunities available to female scientists. I will be bringing to you some of the profiles next week, and hopefully some video also.
I am really looking forward to the second part of Rolf Landua's lecture on antimatter, and the experiments that are taking place in the "Antimatter Factory", which is also known as the antiproton decelerator (AD). Every particle that we know, electron, proton etc has an antimatter equivalent. Electrons have positrons as there antimatter. As far as physicists can tell the matter and antimatter pairs are identical, apart from some minor intrinsic values, such as their charge. At the antimatter factory they have created antiprotons (negatively charged protons) and antihydrogen atoms also. If you have read or seen Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, then you may be under the wrong impression. Although antimatter has been created at CERN, there is no way that 1 g of it could be produced. The AD on average will only produce 1 pair of proton/antiproton out of 250 000 collisions!
This week has seen the start of our working groups on teacher projects. I have decided to interview female physicists that work at CERN and come up with some classroom activities to promote the amazing opportunities available to female scientists. I will be bringing to you some of the profiles next week, and hopefully some video also.
I am really looking forward to the second part of Rolf Landua's lecture on antimatter, and the experiments that are taking place in the "Antimatter Factory", which is also known as the antiproton decelerator (AD). Every particle that we know, electron, proton etc has an antimatter equivalent. Electrons have positrons as there antimatter. As far as physicists can tell the matter and antimatter pairs are identical, apart from some minor intrinsic values, such as their charge. At the antimatter factory they have created antiprotons (negatively charged protons) and antihydrogen atoms also. If you have read or seen Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, then you may be under the wrong impression. Although antimatter has been created at CERN, there is no way that 1 g of it could be produced. The AD on average will only produce 1 pair of proton/antiproton out of 250 000 collisions!
Monday, July 6, 2009
The Geneva Treasure Hunt
The weekend was a real adventure. The time off was really appreciated and on Sunday afternoon, from 3pm-7pm all the teachers from the program participated in a treasure hunt around Geneva. The amazing city was explored from the tram stop, to the cobbled streets of the Old City, to the heights of the Cathedral to the water spray of the Jet D'eau and the boat ride across Lake Geneva. The city is full of amazing architecture, art and history. The evening was spent eating fondue, which was wonderful.
Today we continued on with lectures from Daniel Brandt on an introduction to particle accelerators and the physics ideas behind particle detectors from our resident physicist Gron Jones. The key concepts from Gron's lecture are all to do with momentum and energy, and the importance of the conservation laws in all types of physics, Newtonian and Relativistic. This is a concept that is generally hard for students to grasp, and I hope that the extra information I have gleaned from Gron's lecture will be useful in making better connections in this topic for Physics students.
There was also an announcement of the projects on offer, as we all are to participate in programs that improve the activities already offered by CERN for visiting teachers and students. These projects will be presented at the end of the third week.
Tomorrow holds more lectures and a decision on which project we would like to work on.
Today we continued on with lectures from Daniel Brandt on an introduction to particle accelerators and the physics ideas behind particle detectors from our resident physicist Gron Jones. The key concepts from Gron's lecture are all to do with momentum and energy, and the importance of the conservation laws in all types of physics, Newtonian and Relativistic. This is a concept that is generally hard for students to grasp, and I hope that the extra information I have gleaned from Gron's lecture will be useful in making better connections in this topic for Physics students.
There was also an announcement of the projects on offer, as we all are to participate in programs that improve the activities already offered by CERN for visiting teachers and students. These projects will be presented at the end of the third week.
Tomorrow holds more lectures and a decision on which project we would like to work on.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Particle Physics and Some Fun
Friday we had incredibly informative sessions. The last two lectures by Frank Close, who very kindly signed a book for me (thanks Maria) that he has written, contained a great amount of information on forces, and how the four fundamental forces are now viewed. The four forces are the gravitational (which most particle physicists tend to ignore, because it doesn't yet fit into the Standard Model), electromagnetic, strong and weak. In the Standard Model, electromagnetic and weak are two sides of the one force, hence the unifying term electroweak, which now is used for the forces. I am still chewing on all the information and hope to get my head around it, but if there are any questions, post them and I will try to get them answered while I am here (and have access to books and knowledgeable people!)
Going into Geneva last night was wonderful. Having a picnic in the park opposite Lake Geneva was stunning. The city is very beautiful, and I am looking forward to tomorrow's treasure hunt, through the streets of Geneva!
Today was spent in Montreux, on the banks of Lake Geneva. The world famous jazz festival was starting to come to life and the atmosphere was building up for a great festival.
Getting some rest now, ready for the beginning of week 2 at CERN, next week. :)
Going into Geneva last night was wonderful. Having a picnic in the park opposite Lake Geneva was stunning. The city is very beautiful, and I am looking forward to tomorrow's treasure hunt, through the streets of Geneva!
Today was spent in Montreux, on the banks of Lake Geneva. The world famous jazz festival was starting to come to life and the atmosphere was building up for a great festival.
Getting some rest now, ready for the beginning of week 2 at CERN, next week. :)
Friday, July 3, 2009
Now I Know How My Students Feel!!
Another busy day, lectures in the morning with Frank Close, an introduction to particle physics. A lecture on the particle detector CMS by Piotr Traczyk. An amazing opportunity to ask Frank Close questions one-on-one over (his) lunch. Witnessing a fully packed, sitting on the floor only, lecture theatre listening to the Director General, Rolf Heuer (DG as he is known) talk to the people working at CERN about the short term and mid term plans for the collider, my mind is swirling with new information and many more questions are now surfacing in my head! Now I know what my students feel like when I introduce a new concept and ask them to go home and do some work on it...where do I start!
My colleagues and I have put together a considerable list of questions about all the lectures we have been priveledged to experience so far. My knowledge is severely lacking and I was having some trouble trying to piece the puzzle together. My Danish colleague pointed me to this fabulous site that goes through, in an interactive and quiz based way, the idea of matter and the big questions about what it is. Take a look at this great site:
www.particleadventure.org
My Scottish colleague also pointed me towards a great resource for teachers, who may be lacking in current audio-visual resources. Have a look at this site for free videoclips that you could use:
http://www.teachers.tv/
Tomorrow we are going to be listening to Part 3 & 4 of our series of lectures on particle physics with Frank Close, from Oxford University. I look forward to being able to discuss some of these aspects of particle physics on my blog at a later time.
The second part of our day was spent listening to Rolf Heuer, Director General of CERN and Steve Meyers explaining the amazing story of the events that culminated last September, that put the LHC project on hold. The full story of what took place is only now just becoming apparent to the people working on it. It was in May of this year that the physicists realised that it was the joins between the different sections of the superconducting material and its copper casing that were not soldered properly. A superconducting material should have a VERY VERY VERY small resistance, about 10 micro-ohms at room temperature (about 300 K). The problem was the way the cables were joined. One of 1000's of joints was incorrectly soldered and this meant that the path of the current, which is at 13000 A, encountered a greater resistance, sparking the electrical arc which proved to be the reason for shutting off of the LHC, as the arcing produced considerable damage to one of the sectors of the LHC. The timeline proposed today sees the last of the initial testing of the superconducting cable to be finished by August (so that hopefully no more arcing will take place), but there is no official word on when the collider will be back online. Many are hoping that it will be in September this year, although more testing and repair may be required. The LHC will not be up to full power at this time either, with test runs of the proton beams assumed to be only at about 4 TeV, not the required 7 TeV.
(1 TeV = 1.6 x 10-7 J, the prefix ‘T’ stands for Tera it is equal to 1 trillion = 1000000000000).
That's all for now from CERN :)
My colleagues and I have put together a considerable list of questions about all the lectures we have been priveledged to experience so far. My knowledge is severely lacking and I was having some trouble trying to piece the puzzle together. My Danish colleague pointed me to this fabulous site that goes through, in an interactive and quiz based way, the idea of matter and the big questions about what it is. Take a look at this great site:
www.particleadventure.org
My Scottish colleague also pointed me towards a great resource for teachers, who may be lacking in current audio-visual resources. Have a look at this site for free videoclips that you could use:
http://www.teachers.tv/
Tomorrow we are going to be listening to Part 3 & 4 of our series of lectures on particle physics with Frank Close, from Oxford University. I look forward to being able to discuss some of these aspects of particle physics on my blog at a later time.
The second part of our day was spent listening to Rolf Heuer, Director General of CERN and Steve Meyers explaining the amazing story of the events that culminated last September, that put the LHC project on hold. The full story of what took place is only now just becoming apparent to the people working on it. It was in May of this year that the physicists realised that it was the joins between the different sections of the superconducting material and its copper casing that were not soldered properly. A superconducting material should have a VERY VERY VERY small resistance, about 10 micro-ohms at room temperature (about 300 K). The problem was the way the cables were joined. One of 1000's of joints was incorrectly soldered and this meant that the path of the current, which is at 13000 A, encountered a greater resistance, sparking the electrical arc which proved to be the reason for shutting off of the LHC, as the arcing produced considerable damage to one of the sectors of the LHC. The timeline proposed today sees the last of the initial testing of the superconducting cable to be finished by August (so that hopefully no more arcing will take place), but there is no official word on when the collider will be back online. Many are hoping that it will be in September this year, although more testing and repair may be required. The LHC will not be up to full power at this time either, with test runs of the proton beams assumed to be only at about 4 TeV, not the required 7 TeV.
(1 TeV = 1.6 x 10-7 J, the prefix ‘T’ stands for Tera it is equal to 1 trillion = 1000000000000).
That's all for now from CERN :)
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Yesterday LHCb, today CMS Detector, Tomorrow the World!!
I literally don't know where to start! Everyday has about a 1000 things packed into it, that I actually feel like I have 2 days in 1, and I am sure all of my HST 2009 colleagues would agree.
Last night we had a lovely walk into France, as we are right on the border, for pizza and pasta. It was wonderful to be out and about and walking through the amazing sunflower fields.(although there were a lot of bees!). The weather reminds me of Melbourne, four seasons in one day. The morning is fresh and cool, by lunch time the sun is beating down and then by 4pm the humidity has built up so much there is an afternoon storm. The nights then stay warm until the early morning. I have not mentioned so far the beautiful surrounds of CERN, but sitting in the evening having dinner with Mount Blanc in the background is something that amazes me, so beautiful. I am really looking forward to going into Geneva to explore that beautiful city also!
Today was our first lecture on Particle Detection which was kindly done by Frank Hartmann from Univeritat Karlsruhe. The hour long lecture was mind boggling and really allowed me to see how the nuclear physics that we undertake in high school is but the tip of the ice berg. Although similar principles in particle detection are seen in many of the detectors, from Geiger Counters, 1950's Cloud Chambers, the 1960's Bubble Chambers, the Wire Chambers used in the 80's and the solid state detecors used in the 90's. They all still do the same job, their primary reason for existence is to help determine the momentum and charge of particles that are decaying.
In the afternoon we visited CMS, another of the four detectors of the LHC. This is the smallest in volume, but the heaviest in mass of all the detectors. The CMS and ATLAS (another of the detectors) will hopefully give us some answers about Higgs particle and whether we are taking Physics in the right direction. To check out some great images of CMS check out this link, which was given to the HST team by one of our wonderful guides, Francois: http://www.hatred.ch/index2.php?album=Altera%20Partem/CMS
Over dinner I had the pleasure of meeting Gron, who will be the HST 2009 Physicist in Residence. He is a first year Mechanics and Relativity lecturer at Birmingham University in the UK. His immediate presence sparked amazing conversations about his role as a researcher for the LHC and about high school curriculum and how Universities see the state of education. I am sure that he will spark many more conversations and many more questions about everything related to Physics and Education in the coming weeks.
Tomorrow we are joining the Summer School Students, who come from all over the world as third year Physics students, to study further into particle physics. So tomorrow is our lecture on "Particle Physics for Dummies" ;) Just an introduction to all the exciting particles of matter from Frank Close, from Oxford University in the UK.
With the amount of information that we are all receiving and taking in, I am not sure how I will be able to sleep! Bonne nuit :)
Last night we had a lovely walk into France, as we are right on the border, for pizza and pasta. It was wonderful to be out and about and walking through the amazing sunflower fields.(although there were a lot of bees!). The weather reminds me of Melbourne, four seasons in one day. The morning is fresh and cool, by lunch time the sun is beating down and then by 4pm the humidity has built up so much there is an afternoon storm. The nights then stay warm until the early morning. I have not mentioned so far the beautiful surrounds of CERN, but sitting in the evening having dinner with Mount Blanc in the background is something that amazes me, so beautiful. I am really looking forward to going into Geneva to explore that beautiful city also!
Today was our first lecture on Particle Detection which was kindly done by Frank Hartmann from Univeritat Karlsruhe. The hour long lecture was mind boggling and really allowed me to see how the nuclear physics that we undertake in high school is but the tip of the ice berg. Although similar principles in particle detection are seen in many of the detectors, from Geiger Counters, 1950's Cloud Chambers, the 1960's Bubble Chambers, the Wire Chambers used in the 80's and the solid state detecors used in the 90's. They all still do the same job, their primary reason for existence is to help determine the momentum and charge of particles that are decaying.
In the afternoon we visited CMS, another of the four detectors of the LHC. This is the smallest in volume, but the heaviest in mass of all the detectors. The CMS and ATLAS (another of the detectors) will hopefully give us some answers about Higgs particle and whether we are taking Physics in the right direction. To check out some great images of CMS check out this link, which was given to the HST team by one of our wonderful guides, Francois: http://www.hatred.ch/index2.php?album=Altera%20Partem/CMS
Over dinner I had the pleasure of meeting Gron, who will be the HST 2009 Physicist in Residence. He is a first year Mechanics and Relativity lecturer at Birmingham University in the UK. His immediate presence sparked amazing conversations about his role as a researcher for the LHC and about high school curriculum and how Universities see the state of education. I am sure that he will spark many more conversations and many more questions about everything related to Physics and Education in the coming weeks.
Tomorrow we are joining the Summer School Students, who come from all over the world as third year Physics students, to study further into particle physics. So tomorrow is our lecture on "Particle Physics for Dummies" ;) Just an introduction to all the exciting particles of matter from Frank Close, from Oxford University in the UK.
With the amount of information that we are all receiving and taking in, I am not sure how I will be able to sleep! Bonne nuit :)
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
LHCb Detector
WOW! Today was so exciting. Visiting the LHCb (Large Hadron Collider Beauty) detector (it is part of the LHC and is being used to find b particles, which means particles that contain the beauty quark).
This amazing detector is so large and includes many parts. The amazing part is that it is trying to detect these particles that only last for a manner of pico seconds (about a million of a millionth of a second or 0.000000000001 s). The system includes a giant magnet, VeLo (which measures the distance between the collision point of the proton beam and the point where the beauty quarks decay, to an accuracy of a 100th of a millimetre), Cherenkov detectors, trackers (inner and outer), electromagnetic calorimeters and a muon detection system.
From the 10 million proton collisions every second, LHCb records the data from just 2000. By studying the slight difference in decay between the beauty quark and its antiparticle to unpreceded precision, LHCb is shedding light on one of the Universe's most fundamental mystery, The Big Bang. LHCb is on the lookout for signs of a whole new family of particles that could make up some of the dark matter that pervades the Universe. This mystery matter makes galaxies spin faster than expected and deviates the light from stars.
At the moment cosmic rays provide the team with small amounts of data to callibrate the experiment. Hopefully in October, when the LHC is reactivated, there will be a lot more data and information to provide about these amazing particles!
This amazing detector is so large and includes many parts. The amazing part is that it is trying to detect these particles that only last for a manner of pico seconds (about a million of a millionth of a second or 0.000000000001 s). The system includes a giant magnet, VeLo (which measures the distance between the collision point of the proton beam and the point where the beauty quarks decay, to an accuracy of a 100th of a millimetre), Cherenkov detectors, trackers (inner and outer), electromagnetic calorimeters and a muon detection system.
From the 10 million proton collisions every second, LHCb records the data from just 2000. By studying the slight difference in decay between the beauty quark and its antiparticle to unpreceded precision, LHCb is shedding light on one of the Universe's most fundamental mystery, The Big Bang. LHCb is on the lookout for signs of a whole new family of particles that could make up some of the dark matter that pervades the Universe. This mystery matter makes galaxies spin faster than expected and deviates the light from stars.
At the moment cosmic rays provide the team with small amounts of data to callibrate the experiment. Hopefully in October, when the LHC is reactivated, there will be a lot more data and information to provide about these amazing particles!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Steven Weinberg
Winner of the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics
The Geneva Treasure Hunt
The Standard Model
Q: What is France famous for?
A: Particle Detectors & Sunflowers
Microcosm Exhibit
Look...I'm in the Collider!
First Day at CERN
LHC Dipole Magnet @ CERN
