A rectangle
TALENT: Training in Advanced Low Energy Nuclear Theory
Training the next generation of nuclear physicists
FRIB banner

Course 10: Fundamental Symmetries and Neutrinos

The TALENT/INT course on Fundamental Symmetries and Neutrinos was held at the University of Washington, Seattle, WA from July 9 to July 27, 2018. See the course home page for materials.

Course organizers: Vincenzo Cirigliano and Michael Ramsey-Musolf

This course will introduce students to the exciting physics of fundamental symmetry tests and neutrino studies in nuclear physics, including implications for both the Standard Model and possible physics beyond the Standard Model. They primary objectives are:

  • Helping students and early post-docs become aware of the open challenges in fundamental symmetries and neutrinos and the broader context in which they reside.
  • Provide an introduction to some of the relevant theoretical methods for students whose interest may be piqued by the relevant open problems.
  • Enable students to develop appreciation for the questions this subfield seeks to address, the motivation for the significant experimental efforts underway, and the cross-disciplinary nature of this research.

The principal lecturers will be Vincenzo Cirigliano and Michael Ramsey-Musolf, with guest lecturers to be announced. Topics:

  • Overview, review of the Standard Model, open problems with the Standard Model and introduction to effective operators Neutrino phenomenology
  • Lepton number violation & neutrinoless double beta decay; introduction to out of equilibrium field theory
  • Cosmological & astro-particle connections: leptogenesis, neutrinos and the CMB; quantum Boltzmann equations for leptogenesis
  • Neutrino model building & experimental horizons
  • CPV within and beyond the Standard Model; introduction to EDMs, CPV in kaon and B-meson physics; effective operators and their renormalization group evolution
  • The short distance physics of EDMs & matching onto effective operators; Peccei-Quinn symmetry & axions
  • CPV at the hadronic scale; nucleon EDMs in chiral perturbation theory and lattice QCD
  • The many-body physics of EDMs; atomic EDMs & the Schiff moment
  • Inter-frontier connections: electroweak baryogenesis; high-energy probes; finite-T & non-equilibrium field theory continued
  • Precision tests phenomenology (low- and high-energy); introduction to electroweak radiative corrections
  • Neutral current tests: Z-pole studies, parity-violating electron scattering; hadronic & nuclear form factors; electroweak radiative corrections & the running weak mixing angle; oblique parameters
  • Charged current tests: muon-decay, pion-decay, & beta-decay; CKM unitarity tests;
  • Muon g-2 & charged lepton flavor violation; dispersion relations & hadronic vacuum polarization
  • Hadronic parity-violation; dark photons; equivalence principle tests

Sponsors: Financial support for this TALENT course is provided by the Institute for Nuclear Theory (INT), US Department of Energy (DOE), Amherst Center for Fundamental Interactions, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and FRIB-TA.