REU Site: Undergraduate Research in Nuclear and Particle Physics at TUNL and Duke University

Duke University, Durham NC

Investigators

Abstract

This award will support the renewal of the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL) and Duke University Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) Site with an international component at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. TUNL is a research consortium consisting of three major universities in the North Carolina Triangle Area, Duke University, North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The program will provide opportunities for students to participate in research on a broad range of topics in nuclear and particle physics. Eight students will conduct research at TUNL, and the other four will spend part of their summer at CERN working with the Duke high-energy physics group. This REU summer program provides undergraduate students with an active research experience for ten weeks through participation in scientific investigations at the frontiers of nuclear and particle physics. Each student is assigned a faculty mentor and is integrated into a research group consisting of faculty, postdocs, graduate students and other undergraduate students. Through active research, seminars, lab tours, and discussion groups, the students are exposed to various aspects of nuclear and particle physics research and their connections to other science areas. Lecture and seminar topics are chosen to emphasize the nuclear and particle physics research activities at TUNL and CERN, respectively. The students will have opportunities to interact with world-renowned physicists, learn about the most advanced theoretical concepts in the fields, and work with state-of-the-art technologies used in these research areas.