2003 17th International Conference on Few-Body Problems in Physics [FB17], Durham, NC, USA, June 5-10.
Topics in Heavy-Ion Collisions, Montreal, PQ, Canada, June 25-28.
10th International Symposium on Meson-Nucleon Physics [MENU-10], Beijing, China, August 29 - September 4, 2004.
2004 22nd International Nuclear Physics Conference [INPC2004], Goteborg, Sweden, June 27 - July 2.
16th International Spin Physics Symposium [SPIN2004], Trieste, Italy, October 10-16.
2005 17th Particles and Nuclei International Conference [PANIC2005], Santa Fe, NM, USA, October 23-27, 2005.
Following up on various initiatives in the past and discussions which toke place at the C12 Annual General Meeting in 2003, it was decided to form the Committee on International Cooperation in Nuclear Physics. This committee met for the first time in 2004 and again in 2005 just prior to the Annual General Meetings of C12. Its first task was the compilation of information on all nuclear physics laboratoria and institutes worldwide (a preliminary version of this brochure is available). At the 2005 meeting CICNP proposed to IUPAP that it be recognized as a IUPAP Working Group. This proposal was accepted by IUPAP Council and the IUPAP General Assembly in Capetown, South Africa (October 23-27, 2005). Details about the mandate, the membership, and the organization of the Working Group can be found on the IUPAP website under "Working Groups"
Nuclear physics is driven by fundamental investigations on the origin, evolution, and structure of strongly interacting nuclear matter. This is a challenging mandate that requires a balanced program of experimental and theoretical effort to address a series of key questions which carry to the larger scientific community. There is broad international consensus on these more important questions as these are given in nearly identical formulations in both the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee (NSAC) report in 2002 and in the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committtee (NuPECC) report in 2004. The five key questions are then:
Nucleons are composite particles made up of quarks and gluons. There exists to date partial answers on how the quarks are distributed and move within the nucleon and the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded for the discovery of asymptotic freedom within the context of perturbative Quantum Chromo-Dynamics (QCD). However, QCD is unsolved in the confinement regime where the quark coupling strength is too large to permit perturbative methods to be used. One of the central problems in nuclear physics remains the connection of the observed properties of the hadrons to the underlying theoretical framework of QCD. The solution requires advances both in theory and experiment. Recent advances in lattice QCD, in combination with chiral perturbation theory, allows to extrapolate full lattice simulations to physical quark masses, and thus direct comparison with experimental observables. Experiments designed to make detailed comparisons with QCD predictions are high-priority endeavours for research at facilities across the USA and Europe. the objectives are: a tomographic view of the quarks and their motion within the nucleon; a detailed understanding of how QCD gives rise to the properties of the lighter hadrons; and how these properties are modified when they are placed in a nuclear environment.
The original and central role of nuclear physics is to understand the properties of nuclei and nuclear matter. This is a formidable task, which is better approached in steps: from the basic equations of QCD through effective field theories to nucleon-nucleon interactions and few-body systems and very-light nuclei; and further on to the many approaches used to describe nuclear structure, ranging from exact methods such as Green's Function Monte Carlo (GFMC) to the shell model and density functional theory. While calculations based on the nucleon-nucleon interaction have achieved quantitative success in reproducing the features of light nuclei, detailed agreement is still lacking for heavier nuclei. This is a problem not restricted to the description of heavy nuclei but is common to the description of other complex systems, e.g., proteins. In nuclear physics the development of a comprehensive, predictive theory of complex nuclei is a key goal for nuclear physics. Worldwide this has driven the development of high-quality and multi-faceted radioactive beams, as these allow to move from a one-dimensional picture where the mass of the nucleus varies, to a two-dimensional picture where both proton and neutron numbers vary over a wide range.
Nuclei are an important manifestation of nuclear matter, since they make up 99.9% of the visible matter in the universe. But a humiliating realization is the preponderance in the universe of dark matter and dark energy. At the highest densities, yet at still rather low temperatures, the quarks making up the nucleons of nuclear matter may form a new state of nuclear matter, which is color superconducting. Nuclear matter can also be heated by absorbing energy in a relativistic collision. In this case 'nuclear temperatures' can reach values that represent the state of matter that existed during the first moments after the big bang. The quest for the so-called quark-gluon plasma is an active field of study at international facilities such as GSI in Germany, the LHC at CERN, and RHIC in the USA.
Primordial nucleosynthesis, nucleosynthesis that occurred during the cooling immediately following the big bang, gave rise to the primordial abundances of H, He, and Li. All other chemical elements in the universe were produced as a result of the nuclear reactions occurring in stars, during supernovae explosions, novae, neutron star mergers, etc. It is another central objective of nuclear physics to explain the origin and abondances of matter in the universe; nuclear astrophysics addresses then the many fundamental questions involving nuclear physics issues that remain. These include: the origin of the elements, the mechanism of core-collapse in supernovae; the structure and cooling of neutron stars and presence of strange matter; the origin, acceleration, and interactions of the highest energy cosmic rays; and the nature of galactic and extragalactic gamma-ray sources. Nuclear astrophysics has benefited enormalously from progress in astronomical observation and modeling. A new era in nuclear astrophysics has opened up with the advent of radio-active beam facilities dedicated to the measurement of nuclear reactions involving short-lived nuclides of particular relevance to astrophysics. These include measurements of the various nuclear capture processes and the determination of masses, half-lives, and structures of rare nuclei that occur in cataclysmic stellar environments.
The forces and interactions that were in play in the early stages of the universe have shaped the cosmos as it is known today. Nuclear physicists have long studied the fundamental symmetries of the weak interaction, and probed the Standard Model with precision, low- and intermediate-energy experiments. While the Standard Model has proved to be remarkable resilient to these tests, there are a few indications of physics beyond the Standard Model. If the breakdown of the Standard Model is confirmed, this could constitute the first indication of super-symmetry, which offers a possible explanation of the dark matter of the universe. A new generation of experiments, designed to push the limits of discovery and precision, can be grouped as follows:
* Based on the Brief presented by the Division of Nuclear Physics (Canadian Association of Physicists) Committee presented to the NSERC Long Range Planing Committee for Subatomic Physics in November 2005.
TRIUMF, December 14, 2005