To build upon the students' knowledge of stellar evolution and describe techniques currently employed to investigate the evolution of stellar populations in the universe. To provide the physical background underlying these techniques, and study their application to observations of Galactic and extra galactic stellar systems.

(LO1) An understanding of the Standard Model and its extensions. This will be placed in context of the understanding of the origin of the universe, its properties and its physical laws

(LO2) An understanding of how present and future detector and accelerator technology will be applied to investigate the development of the Standard Model

(LO2) An understanding of how present and future detector and accelerator technology will be applied to investigate the development of the Standard Model

(LO3) An understanding of the effects of symmetries on particle properties

(LO4) Ablity to caclulate decay rates for particles

(S1) Problem solving skills

(S2) International awareness

(S3) Organisational skills

(S4) Problem solving/ critical thinking/ creativity analysing facts and situations and applying creative thinking to develop appropriate solutions.

From stellar evolution models to observations. Stellar spectra, bolometric corrections, colour magnitude diagrams. Basics of Asteroseismology Concept of simple and composite resolved stellar populations, theoretical isochrones, age/distance diagnostics for simple stellar populations, star formation history determinations for composite stellar populations. Unresolved stellar populations, population synthesis methods, theoretical predictions of integrated spectra and magnitudes of unresolved stellar populations. Age-metallicity degeneracy. Age/metallicity diagnostics based on integrated spectra and integrated magnitudes, stellar mass-to-light ratio estimates.

Week 1
Relativity and tensor notation, Maxwell’s equations in tensor form, Proca equation.    

Week 2.   
Klein Gordon and Dirac equations, Gamma matrices, solutions for free particles, properties of Dirac spinor

Week 3.   
Par ity. Charge Conjugation. Helicity. Chirality.

Week 4.   
Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formalism.      

Week 5.   
Decay Rates, Cross-sections, Mandelstam variables, Matrix Elements.  

Week 6.   
Feynman Rules for QED. QED matrix element calculations.

Week 7.   
Parity Violation in Weak Interaction. V-A structure. Helicity structure. Pion Decay. Leptonic Weak Interactions. Lepton Universality.       

Week 8.   
W-bosons and their properties, weak isospin and elements of flavour physics

Week 9   
Elements of QCD, colour, quark scattering, hadron spectroscopy, deep inelastic scattering, parton distribution functions, discovery of the gluon and the quarks.

Week 10.  
W Boson decay. Electroweak Unification . Z Boson resonance and decay. Precision electroweak measurements.       

Week 11.  
Higgs searches prior to the LHC. Discoveries of gluon, W, Z, top quark, Higgs.       

Week 12.  
Deficiencies of the Standard Model. Possible extensions.                Future prospects. Outline of current/future experiments.

Teaching Method 1 - Lecture
Description: 
Attendance Recorded: Yes
Notes: In three blocks of four lectures each

Teaching Method 2 - Workshop
Description: 
Attendance Recorded: Yes
Notes: 3 workshops of 2 hours

All lecture notes made available from beginning of module via VLE.

All lectures are recorded, and can be streamed by the students via the VLE within 1 day of the lecture.