9722105 Mitchell This U.S.-Brazil Award will support Dr. Gary E. Mitchell of North Carolina State University to work with Dr. Mahir Hussein of the Universidade de Sao Paulo in Brazil, on tests of fundamental symmetries in the compound nucleus. The PIs are interested in the manifestation of symmetry in the nucleus and how it is affected by a many body system. The focus will be on the breaking of one approximate symmetry (isospin) and one fundamental symmetry (parity) in the nucleus. The statistical distributions that characterize the fluctuation properties of the complex nuclear system reflect the underlying symmetries. One can then study the statistical distributions of eigenvalues and of transition strengths to search for the effects of symmetries, and even detect hidden symmetries. Mitchell has been an active participant in the measurements on parity violation and a leader in the measurements on isospin mixing. Hussein is a leader in the application of random matrix theory to nuclear physics and to symmetry breaking in the nucleus. ***
