The Parity Violating Electron Scattering Program of Louisiana Tech University

Louisiana Tech University, Ruston LA

Investigators

Abstract

A central goal of subatomic physics is to gain a comprehensive understanding of the basic "building blocks" of matter, and how they interact with each other. Since its formulation nearly five decades ago, the “Standard Model” of nuclear and particle physics has been remarkably successful and allows us to describe a vast range of physical phenomena. It is known, however, to be incomplete, and there are compelling reasons why the Standard Model should eventually break down and fail to describe some properties of matter. Precision measurements using electron accelerators present an opportunity to test the Standard Model of particle physics and to search for new physics. The Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (Jefferson Lab) in Newport News, Virginia is currently the world's leading laboratory enabling precision tests of the Standard Model through electron scattering experiments. This project will support an effort to precisely determine the weak charge of the electron in a large collaborative experiment, known as MOLLER, at Jefferson Lab. The electroweak mixing angle is a fundamental parameter of the electroweak sector of the standard model of particle physics and a comparison of the measured value, at a particular energy scale, with the predicted value allows for a sensitive search for physics beyond the standard model. The Louisiana Tech University nuclear physics group will collaborate with other US and International groups to measure the weak mixing angle at low energy using parity-violating electron techniques at low momentum transfer; 4.5 x 10-3 GeV/c2 < Q2 < 0.20 GeV/c2. The main goals of the LTU group’s work will be to design and develop charge particle detection systems for the MOLLER experiment, design an electron detector for a polarimeter, design radiation shielding measures for MOLLER, and develop a theoretical interpretation of the experimental results. In addition, the group will finish publishing the results from a prior experiment at Jefferson Lab: Q-weak. Louisiana Tech University is located in a rural area of Northern Louisiana. In recent years, all of the surrounding universities have eliminated their physics departments leaving the Louisiana Tech program as the only physics undergraduate or graduate program available in Northern Louisiana. The LTU commitment to the involvement of undergraduates in research is one of the reasons they have a physics undergraduate program. The NSF funding will enable underrepresented groups from several disciplines, engineers, science teachers, and high school students to participate in forefront physics research. This project is jointly funded by the Physics Division and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR). This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.