Lawrence Gibbons
Professor
Precision measurements, CP violation, weak interactions, electroweak symmetry breaking, heavy quark physics, experimental particle physics.
Research
My research interests center on precision measurements of fundamental parameters in particle physics. I am continuing these pursuits with the new “g-2” experiment, E989, which will be running at Fermilab for several more years. The experiment goals are a determination of the anomalous magnetic moment of the muons– that is, the deviation of its Landé g factor from 2 – to a precision of ~ 0.1 parts per million. At this level of precision, the measurement is sensitive to contributions to the magnetic moment from new fundamental particles outside of the Standard Model. The level of contribution of Beyond Standard Model processes to g-2 varies widely according to the nature of the model, and a g-2 measurement at the precision planned will therefore provide an excellent constraint on the nature of new particles that will be observed directly at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The heart of the experiment is the muon storage ring, and I am joined in the Cornell effort by Dave Rubin, who brings considerable accelerator physics expertise. I am involved in work with the detectors that will be used to measure the daughter electrons from the muon decays. The experiment is currently in its current stage, so a student joining now has the rare opportunity to be involved almost all stages of a modern High Energy Physics (HEP) experiment.
Educational Background
B. A., 1985, University of Chicago. Ph.D., 1993, University of Chicago. Research Associate, University of Rochester, 1993-97. Assistant Professor, Physics, Cornell University, 1997-2004. Associate Professor, Physics, Cornell, 2004-2015. Professor, Physics, Cornell, 2015-present.