Webinar: Synergy of High-Performance Computing and Nuclear Physics to Resolve Long-standing Puzzles: The Proton Spin and Mass

Abstract

More than 99% of the mass of the visible matter resides in hadrons which are bound states of quarks and gluons, collectively called partons. These are the fundamental constituents of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), the theory of strong interactions. While QCD is a very elegant theory, it is highly non-linear and cannot be solved analytically, posing severe limitations on our knowledge of the structure of the hadrons. Lattice QCD is a powerful first-principle formulation that enables the study of hadrons numerically, which is done by defining the continuous equations on a discrete Euclidean four-dimensional lattice.

Hadron structure is among the frontiers of Nuclear and Particle Physics, with the 2015 Nuclear Science Advisory Committee’s Long Range Plan for Nuclear Physics identifying a future electron-ion collider (EIC) as the highest priority for new facility construction. Last year, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS) released an assessment report which strongly endorses the science case for an EIC. The NAS report identified three high-priority science questions to understand hadron structure:

1. How does the mass of the nucleon arise?
2. How does the spin of the nucleon arise?
3. What are the emergent properties of dense systems of gluons?

In this talk, Dr. Constantinou will discuss progress in Lattice QCD related to aspects of the above questions, with the main focus on the origin of the mass, and the spin decomposition. She will show results for the proton, which provides an ideal system for studying QCD dynamics. She will discuss the strengths of lattice calculations, but also identify the challenges associated with the elimination of systematic uncertainties.

About the Speaker
 

Dr. Martha Constantinou received her bachelor (2003) and doctoral (2008) degree from the Department of Physics of the University of Cyprus. In 2012, she was a visiting lecturer at the University of Cyprus and has held Postdoctoral Fellow positions at the University of Cyprus and CaSToRC of The Cyprus Institute. As of 2016, Dr. Constantinou is an Assistant Professor (tenure track) at the internationally renowned University of Temple in Philadelphia, USA. In 2020, she was awarded the Selma Lee Bloch Brown Professorship (College of Science and Technology of Temple University) and is a Fellow of the Center for Nuclear Femtography, Southeastern Universities Research Association. She is a recipient of the prestigious Early Career Award by the US Department of Energy (2019-2024). Dr. Constantinou’s research focuses on the field of theoretical Nuclear Physics, particularly in studies of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), the fundamental theory, and the strong nuclear force. This interaction links quarks and gluons together to form protons and neutrons, which are the basic structural elements of matter that make up the visible world.

 

Download the Spring 2021 Online EuroCC & SimEA Seminar Series Programme here.

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