Research

My field of research is nuclear and particle physics. Currently, my main activities focus on two projects at Jefferson Lab in Newport News, Virginia: hypernuclear spectroscopy and the GlueX Experiment.

Hypernuclear Spectroscopy

Ordinary nuclei are composed of protons and neutrons which in turn contain up and down quarks. In a hyperon, one of the original quarks is substituted by a strange quark. A hypernucleus contains a hyperon implanted as an “impurity” within the nuclear medium. Precise information about the mass and excitation energies of hypernuclei allows one to infer the underlying hyperon-nucleon interaction, which is not yet well known. Further, it is believed that some supernova explosions leave a neutron star as a remnant and that at least some regions in neutron stars are made up of matter containing strange quarks. A comprehensive set of hypernuclear data ultimately will also constrain current models of possible strange matter in stellar objects.

I am a co-spokesperson of two current (12 GeV era) and three past (6 GeV era) experiments at Jefferson Lab:

  • E12-17-003: Determining the Unknown Lambda-n Interaction by Investigating the Lambda-nn Resonance
  • E12-15-008: An isospin dependence study of the ΛN interaction through the high precision spectroscopy of Λ-hypernuclei with electron beam
  • E05-115: Spectroscopic investigation of the hypernuclei in the wide mass region using (e,e’K+) reaction
  • E01-011: Spectroscopic Study of Lambda Hypernuclei Up To Medium-Heavy Mass Region Through the (e,e’K+) Reaction
  • E91-016: Electroproduction of Kaons and Light Hypernuclei

The GlueX Experiment

All matter surrounding us is made up of atoms, which are composed of electrons and nuclei. The atomic nuclei in turn contain protons and neutrons, which at its most fundamental level contain quarks and gluons. The negatively charged electrons are bound to the positive nuclei by the electromagnetic force, which in QED is described by the exchange of photons (light particles). The quarks inside protons and neutrons are bound by the strong force, which in QCD is described by the exchange of gluons. In contrast to photons, which do not carry charge, gluons carry so-called color charge; therefore, gluons can also interact with other gluons. This gives rise to new predicted phenomena, called gluonic excitations (GlueX). The GlueX experiment has been build to search for particles with such excitations; as such, it is a fundamental test of QCD.

I am an active member of the GlueX collaboration.

For more information on Nuclear Science at FIU see our page Interdisciplinary Nuclear Research & Education Program.

The Electron Ion Collider (EIC)

I am a member of the EIC user group and the EPIC collaboration. …

Publications

A fairly comprehensive and up-to-date list of my publications can be found at inSPIRE, the High Energy Physics information system.