Oxford Physics Alumni

Panel discussion with Prof John Womersley (STFC), Prof John Wheater (Department of Physics), Prof Ian Shipsey (Particle Physics), Prof Dave Wark (Particle Physics), Prof Daniella Bortoletto (Physics) and Prof Subir Sarkar (Particle Theory Group)

Professor John Womersley (STFC) gives the Particle Physics Christmas Lecture. In the past five years particle physicists have made major advances in understanding the nature of our universe – discovering the Higgs boson, and more recently detecting gravitational waves from a distant galaxy. Paradoxically we have also learned a lot more about what we don’t know: that the particles and forces we understand in ever greater detail make up only a small fraction of what’s in the cosmos, and that our theoretical prejudices about what remains to be discovered may have been very wrong. A new generation of ambitious experiments at accelerator laboratories, underground, and studying at the large scale structure of the universe will answer these questions – and surely open up others. I will also outline why it is essential that the country remains at the forefront of frontier research of this kind and how it contributes more broadly to society.

The Scientific Legacy of Dick Dalitz On February 11 2016, the weekly seminar of the Particle Theory Group in the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics was devoted to a celebration of the work of Richard H Dalitz FRS (1925-2006) who founded the group in 1963. His distinguished ex-students Frank Close (DPhil 1969) and Sir Christopher Llewellyn-Smith FRS (DPhil 1971) gave accounts of the seminal contributions Dick made to our understanding of the fundamental structure of matter. The talks were enlivened with personal reminiscences and are being made available on-line especially for the many alumni who could not come to the event. Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 3rd morning of Theoretical Physics covering the subject of Inner Space Meets Outer Space: Covering the Connections Between Cosmology and Particle Physics The IceCube Neutrino Observatory buried in the icecap below the South Pole has recently detected 28 events initiated by neutrinos with energies extending up to a thousand times higher than the reach of terrestrial accelerators. The are very unlikely to have originated from cosmic ray interactions in the Earth's atmosphere and are likely to have come from distant sources such as supermassive black holes in the centres of galaxies and gamma-ray bursts. I will discuss the experimental results which herald the birth of a new astronomy, as well as opening a new window on to physics beyond the Standard Model.

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 6th morning of Theoretical Physics covering the ways in which ideas from theoretical particle physics guide the high energy accelerator program at CERN

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 6th morning of Theoretical Physics covering the ways in which ideas from theoretical particle physics guide the high energy accelerator program at CERN

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 6th morning of Theoretical Physics covering the ways in which ideas from theoretical particle physics guide the high energy accelerator programme at CERN.

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the first Saturday Morning of Theoretical Physics on 22 June 2013. The event focussed on how we use field theory to understand material reality. Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 4th morning of Theoretical Physics covering the subject of Plasmas: the normal form of matter and the key to unlimited energy.

Members of the Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics hosted the 3rd morning of Theoretical Physics. The event focused on the interface between theoretical developments in particle physics and astrophysics/cosmology.