Title: Challenges and opportunities in the quark-flavour sector

Speaker: Prof. Yuehong Xie, Central China Normal University

Time and place: 13:00-14:00, October 24 (Thursday), 2013, Lecture Hall/INPAC

Abstract:

Recent results in the quark flavour sector are in good agreement with the Standard Model (SM). While this confirms the validity of the CKM mechanism in describing flavour and CP violation at current precision level, it also poses challenges in the flavor sector: we need to search for phenomena beyond the SM in higher precision and wider scope. After introducing the challenges, the speaker will share his first-hand experience in turning challenges into opportunities, with the intention to motivate young students and researchers to be more innovative in scientific research.

Biography:

• Education

BSc and MSc in theoretical physics, Nankai University

PhD in particle physics, Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1998

• Positions

1999-2001 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, National Institute of Nuclear Physics, Italy

2002-2003 Scientific Associate, European Organization for Nuclear Physics, Switzerland

2004-2013 Senior Research Scientist, University of Edinburgh, UK.

2013 Professor of physics, Central China Normal University

• Field of interests

Precision test of the Standard Model and search for phenomena beyond the SM in the flavor sector

• Representative Achievements and Innovations

1. Leading the most precise measurement of the Bs meson mixing phase φs , one of the most important physics results from LHCb

2. Development of the theoretical method that led to the first determination of the sign of the Bs decay width difference ΔΓs

3. Development of the sFit method for background treatment in data fitting, which has benefitted many LHCb data analyses

4. Proposal of a method for probing right-handed new physics in Bs → φγ , which made it a key physics goal for LHCb detector upgrade