PARTICLE PHYSICS

Nuclear & Particle Physics is an introduction to the subject and provides a readable and up-to-date overview of both the theoretical and experimental aspects of nuclear and particle physics, with an emphasis on the phenomenological interpretation of experimental phenomena.

Completely revised, this edition incorporates several new and greatly expanded sections, including additional material on:

•    Penning trap measurements of nuclear masses
•    nuclear beta decay
•    time reversal invariance and tests via measurements of electric dipole moments
•    nuclear weapons
•    experimental searches for the Higgs boson
•    neutrino physics, including oscillation experiments and experiments on neutrinoless double beta decay
•    CP violation in the decays of B mesons and consequences for the standard model
•    particle astrophysics

There is also a new Appendix on gauge invariance and the Higgs mechanism, tables of data for nuclear and particle physics and additional problems.

This is an invaluable text for all undergraduate physics and astronomy students taking courses in nuclear and particle physics. The book is also valuable as a general reference for the first years of graduate study.

It is common practice to teach nuclear physics and particle physics together in an introductory course and it for such a course that this book was written. The material presented is such that different selections can be made for a short course of about 25-30 lectures depending on the lecturer’s preferences and the students’ backgrounds. On the latter, students should have taken a first course in quantum physics, covering the traditional topics in non-relativistic quantum mechanics and atomic physics. A few lectures on relativistic kinematics would also be useful, but this is not essential, as the necessary background is given in an appendix and is only used in a few places in the book. I have not tried to be rigorous, or present proofs of all the statements in the text. Rather, I have taken the view that it is more important that students see an overview of the subject, which for many, probably the majority, will be the only time they study nuclear and particle physics. For future specialists, the details will form part of more advanced courses. Nevertheless, space restrictions have still meant that it has been necessarily to make a choice of topics and doubtless other, equally valid, choices could have been made. This is particularly true in Chapter 8, which deals with applications of nuclear physics, where I have chosen just three major areas to discuss and also applies to Chapter 9, where some of the outstanding problems of nuclear and particle physics are briefly discussed.

The structure of this edition edition follows closely that of the first edition. Changes include the rearrangement of some sections and the rewriting and/or expansion of others where, on reflection, I think more explanation is required, or where the clarity could be improved; the inclusion of a number of entirely new sections and two new appendices; modifications to the notation in places to improve consistency of style through the book; the inclusion of additional problems; and updating the text, where appropriate. I have also taken the opportunity to correct misprints and errors that were in the original printing of the first edition, most of which have already been corrected in later reprints of that edition. I will continue to maintain the book’s website, (www.hep.ucl.ac.uk/~brm/npbook.html) where any future comments and corrections will be posted.

Problems are provided for all chapters and appendices except Chapter 9 and Appendices A and D. They are an integral part of the book. The problems are mainly numerical and require values of physical constants that are given in a table in the introductionary pages of the book. A few also require input data that may be found in the references given in notes at the start of the book. Solutions to the problems are given in Appendix F.

Finally, a word about footnotes: readers have always had strong views about these, (‘Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils.’ – Samuel Johnson), so in this book they are designed to provide ‘non-essential’ information only. Thus, for those readers who prefer not to have the flow disrupted, ignoring the footnotes should not detract from understanding the text. Nuclear and particle physics have been, and still are, very important parts of the entire subject of physics and its practitioners have won an impressive number of Nobel Prizes. For historical interest, I have therefore noted in the footnotes many of the awards for work related to the field.