BMETE15MF72

Course data
Course name: Particle Physics
Neptun ID: BMETE15MF72
Responsible teacher: Gábor Takács
Programme: Courses for Physicist MSc students
Course data sheet: BMETE15MF72
Requirements, Informations

Informations (semester 2023/24/1)

Important notice: this year there are no classes in the first week!

 

Lectures: every Tuesday 8:15-10:00, in room F3M01. First lecture: 12th September. 

Lecturer: Gábor Takács

 

Exercise classes: starting in the third week, every second Monday 16:15-18:00, in room F3M01. 

Times: 18th Sep, 2nd/16th/30th Oct, 13th/27th Nov and 4th(!)Dec. 

Tutor: Botond Nagy 

 

The course has a team set up in MS Teams under the name Particle Physics (2023/24/1), available only for registered students. The access code is sent via Neptun.

 

Classes

The course consists of 2x45 minutes of lectures every week, and an exercise class, organised as 2x45 minutes biweekly. The language of the course is English.

 

Topics covered 

  1. Overview of scales in Nature. Special relativity. Classification of particles.
  2. Klein-Gordon and Dirac equations.
  3. Introduction to weak interactions. Beta decay, neutrino. Parity and CP violation. CPT symmetry.
  4. Introduction to strong interactions. Isospin, strangeness. SU(3) quark model.
  5. Relativistic field theory, canonical formalism, Noether theorem.
  6. Basic principles of quantum field theory. Feynman rules.
  7. Weak interactions: charged currents, FCNC and GIM mechanism. Flavour mixing. Neutrino oscillations.
  8. Non-Abelian gauge theories.
  9. Fundamentals of quantum chromodynamics.
  10. Spontaneous symmetry breaking, Goldstone theorem. Higgs mechanism.
  11. Electroweak unification. The Standard Model. The Higgs boson.
  12. Overview of latest developments and open problems in particle physics.

Necessary background

- Advanced mechanics (material of course BMETE15AF32)
- Quantum mechanics (material of course BMETE15AF49)

Recommended background

- Advanced quantum mechanics (material of course BMETE15AF36)
- Group theory (material of course BMETE11AF40)

Lecture notes

In preparation: a preliminary version is available (note: for technical reasons, the file is relatively large, cc. 76 MB).

If you find errors, mistakes or misprints, please enter the details into the error report form.

Examination requirements 

To obtain the course signature, it is obligatory to participate at min. 70% of the exercise classes (which means at least 5 of the 7 fortnightly occasions).

 

There is a written test (ZH) at the end of the semester covering the exercise class, with a repeated occasion (pótZH). In case the written test is unsuccessful, there is a supplementary test for obtaining the pass mark (ppZH). Passing the test is a condition to obtain the course signature (i.e. admittance to the final exam).

 

The final exam is oral and covers the lecture material. It consists of one topic chosen randomly from the following

 

List of exam topics 

 

and some short questions regarding the rest of the material. Preparation time is 45 minutes.

 

The final mark is a combination of the written and oral exams with equal weights.