Statistical & Mathematical Foundations

by Prof. Glen Cowan (Royal Holloway, University of London)

Monday 6 Jul 2026, 09:00 → Friday 10 Jul 2026, 16:00 Europe/Zurich

31/3-004 - IT Amphitheatre (CERN)

Abstract

Lecture 1:  Introduction to probability and statistics.

Definition and interpretation of probability, frequentist and Bayesian approaches to statistics, introduction to hypothesis tests, p-values, the Neyman-Pearson lemma.

Lecture 2:  Introduction to parameter estimation / the method of Maximum Likelihood 

Estimators for parameters, bias and variance of parameters, the method of maximum likelihood,  asymptotic properties, relation to Bayesian parameter estimation.

Lecturer Biography 

I obtained my BS in Physics from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1981 and my PhD from University of California, Berkeley, in 1988, with a thesis based on data from the TPC/Two-Gamma Experiment at SLAC.  I was a postdoctoral researcher at the Max-Planck-Institute for Physics in Munich from 1988 to 1992 and at the University of Siegen from 1992 to 1997, during which time I worked on the ALEPH Experiment at the Large Electron-Positron Collider at CERN.  Since 1998 I have been part of the academic staff at Royal Holloway, University of London, where I am currently Professor of Physics.