Module Identifier PH31010  
Module Title NUCLEAR AND PARTICLE PHYSICS  
Academic Year 2003/2004  
Co-ordinator Professor Geraint Vaughan  
Semester Semester 2  
Other staff Dr Xing Li  
Pre-Requisite PH22010 , PH23010 , PH24010 , PH26010 , PH14020  
Course delivery Lecture   20 lectures  
Assessment
Assessment TypeAssessment Length/DetailsProportion
Semester Exam2 Hours end of semester examination for BSc students. 3 hours for MPhys students  80%
Semester Exam3 Hours end of semester examination for MPhys students  80%
Semester Assessment Course Work: 2 example sheets  20%

Learning outcomes

After taking this module students should be able to:

Brief description

Nuclear particles are discussed and the stability of nuclei related to radio-active decay processes. Scattering of particles by nuclei is treated in relation to models for nuclear interaction processes and for nuclear matter. The structural properties of nuclei are related to the nuclear shell model. Nuclear fission and fusion, and the generation of nuclear energy, are described. The different species of hadrons (strongly-interacting particles), with their main properties, are introduced, with relation to the quark model. The leptons (weakly-interacting particles, including neutrinos) are related to the heavy bosons, and the fundamental forces of nature explained using Feynman diagrams. Particle detection devices and (cyclic) particle accelerators are introduced, and recent experiments to investigate the structure of the proton and to discover the top quark are described.

Content

Reading Lists

Books
W.S.C. Williams Nuclear and Particle Physics Oxford Science Publications ISBN 0-19-852046-8
B.R. Martin and G. Shaw Particle Physics 2nd. Wiley ISBN 0-471-97252-5

Notes

This module is at CQFW Level 6