Physics 880.05: Modern Nuclear Theory

Recent changes to this page:

• 05-Mar-98 --- Here's a java simulation of the 2-d Ising model that's pretty good: http://bartok.ucsc.edu/peter/java/ising/ising.html
• 04-Mar-98 --- Don't worry about finishing part 3 of the Project on Problem Set #3. If you turn in parts 1 and 2 of the Project and some progress on part 3, I'll be happy.
• 01-Mar-98 --- Problem Set #4 linked below in the problem set section.

Directory

• Overview of 880.05 Winter and Spring Quarters
• Send feedback to the instructor -- anonymous or not
• Course description and info, syllabus, etc.
• Supplementary References -- web sites, texts, journal articles
• Problem Sets -- suggestions, hints, comments
• Pictures, figures, and graphs
• Maple and Mathematica sessions

Overview of 880.05 Winter and Spring Quarters

Physics 880.05 is a two-quarter sequence exploring some topics of modern nuclear theory. The basic plan is to focus during Winter quarter on topics related to relativistic heavy-ion collisions and the physics of a quark-gluon plasma. We will not attempt to be comprehensive but will look in greater depth at some selected topics, such as the thermodynamics of the phase transition to a quark-gluon plasma. As a reference text we will use Introduction to High-Energy Heavy-Ion Collisions by C.-Y. Wong.

In the Spring quarter, we will explore various aspects of effective field theories (EFT), with an eye toward EFT's for nuclear physics. This means NN scattering and the many-body problem. Expertise (or even a course) in field theory is NOT assumed. The starting point will be the Summer School lectures by Lepage entitled "How to Renormalize the Schrodinger Equation", which is available as a postscript file.

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Send Comments or Questions about Physics 880.05

Send email to Prof. Furnstahl at furnstah@mps.ohio-state.edu

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General Information about Physics 880.05

Course title:

Modern Nuclear Theory

Text:

Introduction to High-Energy Heavy-Ion Collisions by Cheuk-Yin Wong
The text is available at Long's bookstore for about $35. It is also available from amazon.com for $31, but it takes 4-6 weeks to ship.

Material:

The winter quarter will be organized around issues related to quark-gluon plasmas (QGP). Reference chapters for the text are given below but we will not cover the material comprehensively. Planned syllabus:

1. Class Logistics and Physics Overview {period 0}
2. How do we make a QGP? [weeks 1-4]
   1. Kinematic Variables [Ch. 2] {period 1}
   2. Nucleon-Nucleon Collisions [Ch. 3] {period 2}
   3. Hard Processes in Nucleon-Nucleon Collisions [Ch. 4] {period 3}
   4. Soft Particle Production Processes and Models [Chs. 5-8] {period 4}
   5. Nucleus-Nucleus Collisions [Chs. 12, 13] {periods 5-8}
      1. Period 5
      2. Period 6
      3. Period 7
      4. Period 8
3. What is a QGP like? [weeks 5-8]
   1. Thermodynamics and Phase Transitions [Chs. 13, 9] {periods 9-12}
      1. Period 9
      2. Period 10
      3. Period 11
      4. Period 12
   2. Lattice Gauge Theory [Chs. 10, 11] {periods 13-16}
4. How do we measure a QGP? [weeks 9-10]
   1. Dilepton and Photon Emission [Chs. 14, 16] {period 17}
   2. J/\psi Suppression [Ch. 15] {period 18}
   3. Hanbury-Brown-Twiss Interferometry and Disordered Chiral Condensates [Ch. 17] {period 19}
   4. Survey {period 20}

Schedule:

Class meets twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 9-10:30am in Smith 1186.

Grading:

Assigned problems and projects [100%]
No exams!

Instructors:

Prof. Richard Furnstahl
office: 4050 Smith Lab
email: furnstah@mps.ohio-state.edu
phone: 292-4830 (office) or 847-4026 (home)

Dr. James Steele
office: 4080 Smith Lab
email: jsteele@pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu
phone: 292-0995 (office)

Office Hours:

Wednesday 2:30pm and Friday 4:00pm and by appointment. In many cases, however, you can just drop by 4050 or 4080 and find one of us.

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Supplementary References

[More to be added! ]

Web Pages of Interest

• Possible phase diagrams of hadronic matter from various sources.
• OSU Relativistic Heavy-Ion Research Group
• Home page for RHIC, the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider, under construction at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Textbooks and Review Articles

• "High Energy Nuclear Collisions and Quark-Gluon Plasma: International Symposium, Kyoto, Japan, 1991", M. Biyajima et al., eds. (World Scientific, Singapore, 1992).
  SEL library: QC794.6.C6 H54 1992.
• Csernai, L. P., "Introduction to Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collisions," (Wiley, New York, 1994).
  SEL library: QC794.8.H4 C77 1994.
• Donoghue, J. F., E. Golowich, and B. R. Holstein, "Dynamics of the Standard Model," (Cambridge Press, New York, 1992).
• Harris, John W. and Berndt Muller, "The Search for the Quark-Gluon Plasma," Ann. Rev. Nucl. Part. Sci. 46 (1996) 71.
• Muller, Berndt, "The Physics of the Quark-Gluon Plasma," (Springer-Verlag, New York, 1985).
  SEL library: QC718.5.P55 M84 1985.
• Reif, F., "Fundamentals of Statistical and Thermal Physics," (McGraw-Hill, New York, 1965).
• Shuryak, E. V., "The QCD Vacuum, Hadrons, and the Superdense Matter," (World Scientific, Singapore, 1988).

Preprints and Journal Articles

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Problem Sets

The plan is to have five problem sets, with one due roughly every two weeks. The course grade will be based on the problem sets (no in-class exams or final!).

A major component of most of the problem sets will be a mini-project that is designed to build insight and intuition about some aspects of the physics we will be discussing in class. Most of the projects will involve either the use of a math / visualization tool such as Mathematica or Maple or some (simple) computer programming. [More details to follow! ]

In this section of the page, we'll include some hints, suggestions, and comments about each problem set. Stay tuned!

Problem Set #1

Problem Set #2

• Fortran codes for generating random numbers in a binomial distribution (from Numerical Recipes):
  • bnldev.f --- main routine (listed in handout)
  • gammln.f --- routine used by bnldev.f
  • ran1.f --- random number generator
• C codes for generating random numbers in a binomial distribution (from Numerical Recipes):
  • bnldev.c --- main routine (listed in handout)
  • gammln.c --- routine used by bnldev.c
  • ran1.c --- random number generator

Problem Set #3

Problem Set #4

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