Description
This course will discuss the physics program and goals for
the next projects at the high energy frontier. The Standard
Model for Particle Physics has been tested to great detail
over the last 20 years, and measurements are in excellent
agreement with the data. But this model has its shortcomings
and does not explain why the world is as it is. It is
furthermore expected that at higher energies new physics
effects will manifest itself, which are needed to allow the
Standard Model to be stable at our present energies. The
next high energy machines will seek answers to these questions.
In less than two years from now the Large Hadron Collider
(LHC) at CERN will become operational, and will collide
protons at a centre of mass energy of 14 TeV. This high
collision energy will allow to study physics at the TeV
energy scale. These lectures will introduce the LHC machine
and make a tour of the experiments, presently under
construction, that will measure these collisions. The
physics program and measurments at the LHC, and at its
potential luminosity upgrade (SLHC), will be discussed.
Special attention will be given to the long awaited start-up
schedule of the collider and the first results that can be
expected from the LHC experiments.
One of the most important questions which the LHC will
settle is that of electroweak symmetry breaking -- or the
mechanisme that gives mass to the fundamental particles--
which is currently still mysterious. The presently most
popular solution to this problem is the anticipation of the
existence of a scalar "Higgs" field, with associated Higgs
particle. If such particle exists with Standard Model
properties, LHC will find it.
Another major question is what lays beyond the Standard
Model. The high energy limit shortcoming of the Standard
Model suggests that in the region around a TeV or higher,
signals from new physics will set it, through the production
of new particles or the onset of new processes. In these
lectures we will discuss the potential for discovering
Supersymmetry, large extra space dimensions, and a few other
new scenarios.
At a later time, perhaps 10 years from now, an e+e- linear
collider can be the next collider which will be largely
complementary to the LHC, allowing for precision
measurements to be made, in order to understand the exact
nature of the underlying theory for the new physics, when
discovered at the LHC.
These lectures will give a short introduction to the present
linear collider projects and studies, ILC and CLIC, and will
discuss the synergy with the LHC physics program.
Primary author
Albert De Roeck
(CERN)
