With the kind support of the Department of Cultural Affairs of the City of Vienna (MA7), we will host this year Thomas Mannel as the Erwin-Schrödinger Visiting Scientist 2024.
Thomas Mannel studied physics at the Technical University of Darmstadt, where he also received his doctorate. After a research stay at Harvard University in the United States, Mannel completed his habilitation in Darmstadt. His first professorship took him to the University of Karlsruhe. In 2003, he moved to the University of Siegen, where he has held the professorship for theoretical particle physics ever since. Thomas Mannel is co-spokesperson of the Transregional Collaborative Research Center "Phenomenological Elementary Particle Physics after the Higgs Discovery." He is also involved in the joint Cluster of Excellence proposal "Color Meets Flavor" of the Universities of Bonn, Dortmund, and Siegen, which made it to the final round of the Cluster of Excellence competition.
Prof. Mannel conducts research in the field of the phenomenology of elementary particles: He is particularly interested in particles that contain so-called heavy quarks – i.e. the "bottom" and "charm" quark. Mannel was instrumental in developing methods for describing them, based on relativistic quantum theory, which are known in particle physics as effective quantum field theories. The application of these methods, together with enormous experimental efforts, has significantly advanced the field of "quark-flavor physics" — i.e. the description of the interactions between the different types of quarks.
The Erwin Schrödinger Visiting Scientist is funded by the City of Vienna's Department of Cultural Affairs. It aims to promote cultural exchange with scientific research and interaction. The Erwin Schrödinger Visiting Professorship has a long tradition, going back to Walter Thirring in the 1970s and has already been awarded more than 50 times to outstanding researchers in the field of particle physics.
Prof. Mannel will be a guest of the particle physics group between June 9 and 20, and again during the winter semester. His two summer lectures will be held on June 10 and 17.
June 10, 16:15, Erwin Schroedinger Lecture Hall:
Particle Physics after the Higgs Discovery: Searching for Physics beyond the Standard Model (pdf)
Abstract: The discovery of a Higgs boson marked the begin of a new era in particle physics, since it completed the standard model of particle physics, leaving us with a renormalizable quantum field theory. In this talk I will discuss, why we believe that the standard model is very likely not the final fundamental theory and what the options are to test the standard model to find physics beyond this model.
June 17, 16:15, Erwin Schroedinger Lecture Hall:
Inclusive semileptonic B decays: Current status and perspectives
Abstract: Inclusive decays of hadrons with a single heavy quark can be described using the Heavy Quark Expansion (HQE). After a brief introduction and motivation I will discuss the current status of the calculations used to extract the CKM matrix element Vcb and will give the perspectives to further increase the precision of the HQE.
