SWOCC release – Coos Bay, OR – Southwestern Oregon Community College welcomes, as part of our 2019-20 Physics and Astronomy Lecture Series, Dr. Heidi Schellman, Professor of Physics and Physics Department Chair at Oregon State University, to discuss “Science at CERN: The World’s Largest Particle Accelerator”. The lecture will take place on Wednesday, February 12, 2020 at 7pm in the Hales Center for the Performing Arts on the Coos Campus of Southwestern, 1988 Newmark Ave., Coos Bay. CERN is an international scientific laboratory in Switzerland devoted to the study of fundamental particles. 15,000 scientists from around the world do research there. Dr. Schellman will describe how international cooperation in Big Science works and give some idea of what it’s like to build and run an experiment at CERN. Dr. Schellman’s current research program consists of the MINERvA and DUNE experiments at Fermilab, and CERN, which are searching for evidence of charge and parity (CP) particle violation in neutrino scattering, which may explain the matter-anti-matter asymmetry in the Universe. The DUNE experiment will use large liquid-argon detectors in the Homestake Mine in South Dakota to study CP violation and astrophysics. Two prototypes (pictured below) are currently running at CERN. For further information please contact Dr. Aaron Coyner in the Southwestern physics department at (541) 888-7244 or by email at aaron.coyner@socc.edu.
