Nov 21, 2017
Todd Pedlar
Luther College Participation in the Belle II Large Particle Physics Experiment

DRC Sponsor: Don Holmertz

Todd Pedlar, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Physics at Luther College, will be offering our club with fascinating insight into his collaborative work with Luther College student researchers in the Belle II Large Particle Physics Experiment. The research at Luther is part of ongoing work on experiments of the Belle Collaboration, which consists of more than 600 physicists from around the world working together on large particle physics experiments based at KEK, the national high energy physics laboratory located in Japan. Dr. Pedlar's work in elementary particle physics has been supported by four consecutive three-year grants from the National Science Foundation, funding that has allowed him and his students to make substantial contributions toward refinement and extension of our understanding of the strong nuclear interaction, one of four fundamental forces that bind matter together. His work also provides a rare opportunity for undergraduate physics students to become meaningfully involved in data analysis and contribute to the important work of operating the Belle II hardware and software systems.