Grant: Subatomic Physics Envelope - Individual

Particles such as protons, neutrons and others which have the so-called strong or nuclear interactions are made up of more fundamental entities called quarks and gluons. The quarks and gluons can be described by a theory called Quantum Chromodynamics. Large-scale computer simulations are used to study Quantum Chromodynamics and test our understanding of nuclear interactions at a fundamental microscopic level. Quarks much heavier than the usual building blocks of protons and neutrons have been discovered. The proposed research deals with calculation of strongly interacting systems containing heavy quarks and in particular how such systems are affected by quantum fluctuations of quark - antiquarks in the vacuum. These studies will provide information which will be useful for experiments which may, in the future, search for yet undiscovered heavy-quark analogs of neutrons and protons.