"The highest luminosity particle accelerator in the world and some physics being done at KEK" Dr. Milind V Purohit "

Speaker

Dr. Milind V Purohit, Professor and Chair, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC

Profile

I specialize in the field of elementary particle physics, sometimes called "High Energy Physics" because of the extremely high energies involved (per particle).

I completed my Ph. D. work in October 1983 and received my Ph.D. in this field in 1984 from the California Institute of Technology. I was a Wilson Fellow at Fermilab near Chicago where I was one of the founders of the E791 experiment, and was its co-leader for about 15 years. Shortly after becoming co-spokesperson I went to Princeton University as an assistant professor during the years 1988-1994.  I was awarded tenure at the Univ. of South Carolina and subsequently was promoted to full professor here in 1999. I have been the chair of our department since 2013.

Science Talk

Title

"The highest luminosity particle accelerator in the world and some physics being done at KEK"

Abstract

The world's highest luminosity particle accelerator, i.e., with the most particle collisions per second, is the new accelerator called SuperKEKB at the KEK lab in Tsukuba, Japan. Work at this site led to the experimental confirmations of a theory by Drs. Kobayashi and Maskawa and they were awarded the Nobel Prize in physics in 2008.

This exciting physics done on the "Belle" experiment will be outlined along with the new large experiment being built there (Belle II) and its goals. It's an exciting time in particle physics and we hope to make some fundamental progress in understanding why we humans even exist!

Some such projected analyses and their expected outcomes will be described.

The talk will also touch on some of the engineering challenges faced by the experiments, how they are met, and the way the very high luminosity of the accelerator is achieved.