University of Cincinnati QuarkNet Center
Submitted by kcecire
on Friday, May 31, 2013 - 17:24
The group is very involved with cosmic ray studies but also active in the LHCb masterclasses.
Description
This group is based at UC with mentors Brian Meadows and Mike Sokoloff. Jeff Rodriguez is the lead teacher.
Neutrino Oscillations at NOVA
Seamus Sweeney Saint Henry District High School
Katheryn Slattery Oak Hills HS
Dr Alex Sousa Mentor
LHCb Analysis of Xi - → Lambda + Pi- + Pr channe
Alexandra Raborn Anderson High School
Will Beckes Summit Country Day School
Dr. Mike Sokoloff Mentor
University of Cincinnati Combined Student abstracts form Summer Research Program
University of Cincinnati annual report
Notes and ideas for LIGO in school
Waves in physics: distance, time for wavespeed
HW: real world examples (e.g. wavespeed)
How to do a research study
- Could work well for science intro class (e.g. Gr 9)
Interferometer:
- changes in fringes due to dropping weights
- general understanding of how it is made and works
- engineering practices
- makes a good demo (6 kits are a bit expensive)
- follow with LIGO lesson/data
- How do you measure that? Students each pick an important experiment: interferometer is in several.
- IB: use diffraction to find wavelength of light - optics option
Posters - good intro to making a poster, easy to use. Useful after IB exam.
IB options:
- imaging
- optics
IB internal assessment - has all the elements including poster creation
Interferometer with LIGO
Images from ppt
Use Data Portfolio activities, e.g penny activity
Student interest: more LIGO instrument, gravitational waves, GTR, etc than seismic data (but all are important)
Great for end-of-semester work
LIGO e-Lab workshop at UC
June 13-14, 2016
Small URL for this page: http://tiny.cc/ligo2016uc.
Objectives
Participating teachers will be able to use the LIGO e-Lab to:
- Plot and interpret data recorded by LIGO seismic instruments
- Explain the importance of LIGO seismic data in gravitiational wave search
- Use LIGO seismic data to demonstrate classical physics concepts.
Agenda
Times and specific activities are subject to adjustment.
Monday 13 June09:00 Coffee, Registration 09:15 Introduction
09:45 Break 10:00 Interferometer activity 10:30 LIGO presentation 11:30 Gravitational Waves Review 12:00 Lunch 13:15 Videos: 13:45 Exploration of LIGO e-Lab:
14:45 Break 15:00 Search and analyze in data:
16:00 LIGO Hanford Virtual Visit 16:30 End of Day
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Tuesday 14 June09:00 Coffee/Reflection
09:15 Exploration of LIGO posters; create research plan 10:30 Break 10:45 Research activity
12:00 Lunch 13:00 Create posters 14:00 Presentations 14:30 Break 14:45 Implementation discussion 15:15 Reflection 15:30 Evaluation 16:00 End of workshop |
Resources |
Contacts |
U Cincinnati QuarkNet Annual Report 2015
How long-baseline neutrino experiments, like MINOS, analyze detector data to extract neutrino oscillation parameters
2015 Summer QuarkNet MINOS Research Project
Theodore Baker (Walnut Hills High School)
Panos Manganaris (Anderson High School)
Mentor Alex Sousa
The purpose of my research this summer was to understand how long-baseline neutrino experiments, like MINOS, analyze detector data to extract neutrino oscillation parameters. By utilizing the ROOT Data Analysis Framework, I first learned basic properties and differences of different types of neutrino interactions through Monte Carlo (simulated) data. Neutrinos interact with other subatomic particles through the weak force. Charged current (CC) interactions occur when a neutrino of any flavor converts to its partner charged lepton (e.g.) through exchange of a boson. Neutral Current (NC) interactions take place when a neutrino interacts with a Z0boson yet does not convert into a charged lepton. Unlike CC events observed in the detector, NC events all look the same no matter the neutrino flavor and therefore are insensitive to neutrino oscillations and are removed from the oscillation analysis. I developed a selection method based on the event length of separate NC and CC events. I then fit the MINOS data reconstructed energy spectrum to a Monte Carlo spectrum oscillated with different sets of values for the oscillation parameters. The best-fit value for sin( Ø23 ) is almost 1 and the best-fit parameter for Δm2/23 is 0.0022, closely matching the MINOS published results. The study of these neutrino oscillations could potentially help us solve the long-standing puzzle of matter-antimatter asymmetry.
Identifying signal and background events in decay channels of D*+
2015 Summer Quarknet LHCb Research Project
Akshansh Gupta (Walnut Hills High School)
Bridget Sypniewski (Mount Notre Dame High School)
Mentor Mike Sokoloff
The purpose of the LHCb work we did was to find signal regions and values from unedited, unclean information sets of different type of particle decays. Several decays were looked at and evaluated throughout the program, including Lambda decays, Dbar decays, and Dstar decays, and multiple Dplus decays. Information on these decays was supplied from LHC. In these decays, there were different intensities of entries. Consistent underlying intensity could be regarded as background, while intensity that peaked particularly high in only a specific location was regarded as signal. The goal for each situation was to find a signal in this information, and to reduce the amount of background so that the signal could be clearly seen and defined, however, in the process of reducing the background, in order to avoid losing any signal value, on occasion, background was still left in the final product. For each decay, several variables were used, such as flight distance and lifetime. These were often used to help discriminate between signal and background on the mass, and occasionally, vice versa. Evaluations were done through the use of TMVA analysis, background subtractions, and discrimination tests. These evaluations were successful at separating a signal from the background for the information given for the decays evaluated, and were generally accurate and similar to established information. The information found in my work will be later passed on to other scientists and students to do further analysis on, as well as evaluated some of the information collected from the LHC and turned raw data into a cleaner more edited format for further use and evaluation.
2014 Annual Report - U Cincinnati
UC QuarkNet Annual Report Information
September, 2014
The QuarkNet Associate Teacher Institute at the University of Cincinnati conducted its 11th annual workshop from Jun 21-25, 2012. This year’s workshop included six teachers. The six associate teachers were from various schools in our tri-state area, including suburban, private, and Catholic schools. Teacher learned about the new online tools and program to use with the cosmic ray detectors. Teachers learned to use EQUIP along with setting up a benchmark for analysis and blessing of data. Teachers conducted an extensive experiment comparing the cosmic ray flux rate through various levels of ceiling material by conducting the study at 15 floor Crosley tower. There were challenges trying to get a location for the four detectors and GPS signal on the various levels of the tower.
To coincide with CERN’s 60th anniversary this year, the laboratory launched the beam line for schools competition. Teachers and students from three of the schools collaborated to join the competition and produce a proposal. Of the 292 proposals submitted for the International CERN competition, the group was one of 16 given the status of highly commended. Watch the video: |