University of Minnesota QuarkNet Center

Submitted by kcecire

on Wednesday, July 24, 2013 - 16:20

The Minnesota QuarkNet group works on all aspects of data from QuarkNet with mentor Greg Pawloski and lead teachers Jon Anderson and Shane Wood.

Description

Minnesota teachers and physicists bringing cosmic and particle data to classrooms.

2015 Annual Report - University of Minnesota

ShaneWood's picture
Submitted by ShaneWood on Wed, 11/25/2015 - 14:28

QuarkNet activity at the University of Minnesota's QuarkNet Center in 2015 included participation in the International Masterclass, and a summer workshop for teachers centered around both LHC/CMS data and cosmic ray muon detector data analyses.  

A total of 18 students and 3 local teachers participated in the Masterclass on March 28th, 2015. The students analyzed data from the CMS detector (WZH), heard talks from Minnesota HEP researcher Dr. Satish Desai and HEP graduate students, and toured the Univesity's Nano Fabrication Center. After analyzing the CMS data, students discussed results locally with Dr. Desai and Dr. Cronin-Hennessy. Throughout the day, several HEP graduate students helped out as well, sharing demos (cloud chambers, etc.) answering student questions, and sharing "life as a grad student" experiences at lunch with the high school students.  

The 3-day summer workshop for teachers was divided into two parts. First was a 1-day workshop in June at the University of Minnesota during which teachers heard two talks (one on consmology (Marco Peloso) and one on dark matter (Mark Pepin)), worked through an activity from the Data Portfolio, and perfromed a data analysis on CMS data (J/Psi).  In August, teachers met again - this time for 2 days at nearby Irondale High School - in order to work through plateuing cosmic ray muon detectors, then uploading and analyzing data from the detectors. Teachers will meet for an additoinal day in December into order to follow up on cosmic ray detector questions and to share ideas regarding implementation.    

As of 2015, there are 12 active Minnesota QuarkNet teachers; eight of whom have cosmic ray muon detectors.  Professor Dan Cronin-Hennessy continues to serve as the group's mentor, planning the workshop days with the assistance of lead teacher Jon Anderson and QN staff Shane Wood.  Minnesota HEP administrator Andrea Stronghart organizes logistics for the group, including rooms, lunches and paperwork.

Images below: (1) Masterclass students on tour (2) QuarkNet teachers discussing the use of cosmic ray muon detectors (3) One teacher group's CRMD set-up varying the angle of the counters.

Minnesota QuarkNet Teacher Workshop Agenda 2015

ShaneWood's picture
Submitted by ShaneWood on Mon, 06/15/2015 - 18:06

Tuesday, 16 June, 2015 - Physics & Nanotechnology Building (PAN), Room 120

9:00 Introductions, overview of day and summer

9:30 Classroom Activities (Found in Data Portfolio)

10:00 Speaker: Marco Peloso (Cosmology)

11:00 Set Criteria for J/Psi 

12:00 Lunch Talk: Mark Pepin (Dark Matter)

1:15 Analysis of J/Psi Data (done in pairs; 100 events/group)

2:00 View/Discuss Results of J/Psi Analysis 

2:30 Share-A-Thon

3:30 Future meetings this summer: CRMD? Elab? Location? Roles/Responsibilities?

4:00 Workshop concludes for day - as long as you can answer "yes" to:
1) Do you know your drupal account info?  Is your account info updated including CRMD #?
2) Do you have your CMS and/or CRMD e-Lab account info?  
3) Before end of workshop - complete "Teacher Implementation Survey" only.

 

Thursday, 13 August, 2015 - Irondale High School (Room 336), 2425 Long Lake Rd., New Brighton, MN 55112

9:00-4:00 (1 hour lunch) Cosmic Ray Detector Workshop

  1. Any detector to build?  (See resources for instructions)
  2. Plateu Detectors
  3. Decide on study...collect data
  4. Upload and Data Analysis
  5. Collect Data overnight

Friday, 14 August, 2015 - Irondale High School (Room 336), 2425 Long Lake Rd., New Brighton, MN 55112 

  1. Upload Data - Analyze in e-Lab
  2. Implementation discussion
  3. "Must Do" items - Do "Implementation Survey" and "Update QuarkNet Website"

2014 Annual Report - University of Minnesota

kcecire's picture
Submitted by kcecire on Mon, 09/22/2014 - 14:06
The QuarkNet workshop at the University of Minnesota this year (2014) on the week of Aug 11. As usual, the agenda and activities were organized by the lead teachers Shane Wood and Jon Anderson. Daniel Cronin-Hennessy served as QuarkNet mentor. This year Bob Peterson from Fermi National Accelerator lab provided 3 days of specialized training for the participants (described below). Finally Jody Kaplan , Minnesota HEP administrator organized rooms, lunches and paperwork. Twelve teachers were in the workshop this year.
 
There was a philosophical shift in our program this year. Typically we try to recruit new participants and expose them to an introductory level material on the standard model and modern particle detectors with an emphasis on demonstrations and concepts that can be utilized in their high school classrooms. This year the participants all had participated in previous workshops. The emphasis for this workshop was to increase the depth of knowledge in a specific area. Our focus was on the cosmic ray telescopes and the use of e-lab in representing data from these telescopes. Bob Peterson came for three days and gave in depth instruction. The goal was that the teachers would have sufficient knowledge to begin to establish a cosmic ray telescope at their own institution. 
 
The first day of the workshop focused on the logistics, overview of cosmic ray science, and overview of QuarkNet in the first half. In the second half the teachers were presented with the hardware components of the telescope and started to workout how to assemble a working unit (with help from Bob). After assembly they performed the plateauing procedure and recorded the particular geometry that was chosen. They also discussed possible measurements each team (each pair) would make over night. The next day they began their introduction to analysis with an overview of e-lab. By the end of the first half of the day they had learned to upload their data from the previous night and learned how to generate graphs in several different layouts. We spent about 1.5 hours discussing the results. The various dependencies the groups looked at included cosmic rates with pressure, temperature, angle and time. They had to deal with issues such as accounting for geometrical differences between the various telescopes used in their studies. We hypothesized several reasons for their observed behavior and discussed follow up experiments that could be used to discriminate various hypotheses. All in all this workshop provided an intense introduction to a complete cycle of experiment – from assembling the detectors to analyzing data and then interpreting the data. 
 
On Thursday the tone changed and we focused on the physics of neutrino oscillations. Dan Cronin-Hennessy gave a talk on the physics and Kanika Sachdev provided a nice introduction to the MINOS and NOvA neutrino experiments. The remainder of the day was spent using the mechanical harmonic oscillators in order to understand the mathematics and physics of neutrino oscillations. This attempt was experimental and the teachers judged it as a very effective way of 
communicating the physics of oscillations. So much so that we are considering an applet on the web to achieve the same goal. The motivation for this approach was from Ken Cecire. One high school teacher who uses coupled oscillations for other purposes in their class taught us a very slick method of controlling the coupling of the oscillators (this was one of their assignments that day). We hope to document this activity more thoroughly soon. The final day of the workshop was a visit to Soudan lab, which hosts the MINOS neutrino Oscillation experiment. 
 
In summary, this year we experimented with a very different type of QuarkNet workshop. I found the teachers highly engaged and enjoying each of the offerings that week. We will hopefully continue to refine and improve our workshops in the future.
 
Sincerely,
 
Daniel Cronin-Hennessy
Associate Professor of Physics, University of Minnesota
 
Photo 1: QN Teachers exploring how to control coupling of oscillators. They measured the period for the normal modes to recycle the original “flavor” of oscillation as a function of the coupling.
Photo 2: QN Teachers visiting Soudan Lab.

 

View PDF of this report: http://leptoquark.hep.nd.edu/~kcecire/drupal_lib/files2014/QNReport2014umn.pdf.

 

 

Day/Night Cosmic Ray analysis

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Wed, 08/13/2014 - 15:57

Description:
See if there is difference between day and night cosmic rays, on the same day.

Standards:

 

Learning Ojectives:

 

Prior Knowledge:

 

Background Matrial:

 

Implementaton:

 

Assessmt:

 

 

Pressure eLab Activity

jbollinger's picture
Submitted by jbollinger on Wed, 08/13/2014 - 13:31
DESCRIPTION
Students will perform a search of the data to determine whether or not there is a relationship between the atmospheric pressure and the flux.  This activity will enable students to become proficient at looking at data and performing flux studies.  Students will report their results using a poster on the eLab site and then present their findings to the class.
 
STANDARDS ADDRESSED
 
Minnesota State Science Standards:
 
9.1.1.1.2 - Understand that scientists conduct investigations for a variety of reasons, including: to discover new aspects of the natural world, to explain observed phenomena, to test the conclusions of prior investigations, or to test the predictions of current theories.
 
9.1.1.2.1 - Formulate a testable hypothesis, design and conduct an experiment to test the hypothesis, analyze the data, consider alternative explanations and draw conclusions supported by evidence from the investigation.
 
9.1.1.2.2 - Evaluate the explanations proposed by others by examining and comparing evidence, identifying faulty reasoning, pointing out statements that go beyond the scientifically acceptable evidence, and suggesting alternative scientific explanations.
 
9.1.1.2.3 - Identify the critical assumptions and logic used in a line of reasoning to judge the validity of a claim.
 
9.1.3.2.2 - Analyze possible careers in science and engineering in terms of education requirements, working practices and rewards.
 
9.1.3.3.2 - Communicate, justify and defend the procedures and results of a scientific inquiry or engineering design project using verbal, graphic, quantitative, virtual or written means.
 
9.1.3.4.3 - Select and use appropriate numeric, symbolic, pictorial, or graphical representation to communicate scientific ideas, procedures and experimental results.
 
9.1.3.4.4 - Relate the reliability of data to consistency of results, identify sources of error, and suggest ways to improve data collection and analysis.
 
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
The student will collect the raw data from cosmic ray detectors throughout the country.
 
The student will create a plot of the pressure data vs. the trigger rate for at least one detector.
 
The student will report their results to their classmates and defend their conclusions using evidence they have collected.
 
PRIOR KNOWLEDGE
Students must be capable of using a spreadsheet program (MS Word)
Students must be familiar
 
BACKGROUND MATERIAL
 
IMPLEMENTATION
 
ASSESSMENT
Students will create a poster on the eLab site.
 
Students will present the poster to the class and be required to defend their claims.
 

CMS Data Workshop at Minnesota

kcecire's picture
Submitted by kcecire on Sat, 08/10/2013 - 09:16

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Location: Tate Laboratory of Physics, Room 130

   

Objectives

Participating teachers:

  • gain knowledge and skills to successfully complete investigations using LHC data;
  • interpret event displays from CMS and explain their meaning;
  • conduct LHC investigations with students and successfully prepare them for masterclass; and
  • assist mentors in organizing and facilitating a masterclass.

 

Agenda

Tuesday 13 August 2013

09:00     Coffee and Daily Opener 

09:15     Introduction/Objectives

09:30     LHC and CMS (J. Mans)

10:30     Break

10:45     QuarkNet Classroom Activities: 

12:00     Working  lunch (continue classroom activities)

13:00     Synthesis/Whiteboard--Classroom Activities

13:30     U of M Physics Demo (Tate 150; B. Anderson)

14:30     Transition back to Tate 130; Break

14:45    CMS Data Express

15:45     Wrap-up 

16:00     End of day

Wednesday 14 August 2013

09:00     Coffee/Recap of Yesterday/Plan for Today

09:30     CMS W/Z Measurement

12:00     Lunch (Fermilab Pre-tour Information)

13:00     Extensions: Intro to e-Labs, Accounts

13:30     Synthesis/Whiteboard--Implementation

14:00     Break

14:15     CMS Data Workshop wrap-up

  • Discussion
  • Evaluation

14:45     Curriculum Swap

16:00     End of workshop

 

Resources

 

Agenda for CSS Teachers' Workshop - August 5-6, 2013

ShaneWood's picture
Submitted by ShaneWood on Thu, 07/25/2013 - 16:54

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Monday 5 August 2013

0:900    Registration and Coffee

09:15    Intro slides

09:30    LHC and CMS (J. Manns)

10:30   CMS e-Lab first look

12:00   lunch - with neutrinos!

13:00   CMS Data Express

14:30   Z mass plot in e-Lab (start at metro map)

16:00   End of day 

Tuesday 6 August, 2013 

09:00  Discussion and creation of research questions

09:30   Videoconference with Sanford Lab underground

10:00   Group work: investigations, posters

12:00   lunch - that meets standards!

13:00   Finalize posters 

13:30   Present posters

14:30   Discussion:

  • Implementation in school
  • Student groups in e-Lab
  • Users group for teachers

15:30   Evaluation  

16:00   End of workshop

Resources

 

Implementation ideas

  • PGP=Pretty Good Physics
  • e-Lab applications math related-use in math or interdisciplinary work
  • summer sci/math boot camp for tchrs
  • use animation feature to show how accuracy/precision of dataset increases with stats
  • independent study for interested students
  • insert into cons of energy, momentum; e&m - colliders give us close to p=0
  • chem-radioactive decay
  • particle physics as bridge between chem and physics
  • PET, med physics connection with biology
  • Use student groups
  • 2 students works
  • after AP or IB exam
  • cosmic ray e-Lab - make connections
  • user group at /group/cms-e-lab-users
  • meetings work better than updates
  • presentations in class
  • students come to University for a "regional particle physics summit"
  • videoconferences
  • grad students come to evening student meeting - each present research - not formal
  • FAQs or suggestins for research projects 

 

Barriers

  • Would have to reserve media center - slow (beeter now with iPads)
  • Assessment
  • Labels not intuitive on plots

Welcome to UMN QuarkNet!

kcecire's picture
Submitted by kcecire on Wed, 07/24/2013 - 16:24

Welcome to the Minnesota QuarkNet Center group. We will be building this over the next few weeks. Here are three things you can do right now:

Edit your site profile 

  1. In the top menu, roll over "My stuff"
  2. Choose "My profile"
  3. Under your group name, choose the "About" button
  4. Find and choose "Edit my profile"
  5. In the "Account" page, you can change your password and upload an avatar image (mine is the silly-looking bird) 
  6. In the "Personal information" page, you can add whether you are a QN teacher, your contact info, etc.

Add a post like this one

  1. In the top menu, roll over "My stuff"
  2. Choose "My groups"
  3. Choose "University of Minnesota QuarkNet Center"
  4. At the top of the right sidebar, choose "Document" from the drop-down list and choose "Create"
  5. Start typing
  6. Edit
  7. Choose the "Save" button at the bottom left when it is time.

Comment on this post

  1. Choose the "Comment" button at the bottom of this post
  2. Type away.
kcecire's picture