Pounding protons

2006 APS-Physics April meeting in Dallas

In the HAPPEx-II experiment at the Jefferson Lab beams of electrons are used to probe the inner workings of the proton. Paul Souder, Syracuse University (I9.1 at the meeting, (souder@physics.syr.edu), and HAPPEx spokesperson Krishna Kumar of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (kkumar@jlab.org) will report on new information about the role of the relatively rare strange quark in contributing to the proton's electric and magnetic properties.

Meanwhile, the experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC), where not single protons but whole gold nuclei (with hundreds of protons and neutrons) are shattered, showed last year that the fireball resulting from the smashup behaved like a gigantic liquid of quarks and gluons. Barbara Jacak of SUNY Stony Brook (A1.2, jacak@skipper.physics.sunysb.edu) will report on a new assessment of the fluid dynamics and other properties of their quark liquid.

Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 21 Feb 2009
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