The CTEQ Collaboration is an informal group of 32 experimental and theoretical high energy physicists from eighteen universities and five national labs, engaged in a program to advance research in and understanding of quantum chromodynamics. Quantum chromodynamics (QCD) governs the strong interactions of elementary particles, and its study at high energies is increasingly shared by both elementary particle and nuclear physics. One of the activities organized by the CTEQ collaboration is a series of CTEQ Summer Schools whose aim is to promote knowledge of QCD and its applications to precision electroweak physics and new physics searches among the younger generation of high energy and nuclear physicists, especially experimentalists. This proposal requests partial support for the 2010 and 2011 CTEQ Summer Schools.
The impact of the CTEQ Summer School on the high energy physics community worldwide is by now well recognized by the major laboratories. On the order of one thousand physicists have attended CTEQ schools. Some of the early students have gone on to be lecturers at more recent schools. The broader impact of these Schools is felt through the students' strengthened awareness of the context of their research in the overall undertaking of fundamental physics. The interactive nature of the schools also encourages the skills necessary for communicating the excitement and results of fundamental physics within collaborations and to the wider public.
This NSF grant has been used for partial support for two summer schools presented by the CTEQ collaboration. The CTEQ collaboration is a unique group of experimentalists and theorists working on the subject of perturbative Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD). Quantum Chromodynamics is a fundamental component of the standard model, and QCD studies themselves are of great interest. The material necessary for high energy physics students to master in the area of QCD is typically not covered by any courses given at their universities. The CTEQ summer schools, held yearly since 1992, serve to fill this gap. Over a thousand students have attended the CTEQ schools, and many of them afterwards have become renown in the field. Students from the early schools have returned to be lecturers at later schools. The CTEQ schools have alternated between a US site (typically Madison, Wisconsin) and a foreign site (in collaboration with local universities). The 2010 school was held in Bad Lauterbad, Germany (in collaboration with MCnet) and the 2011 school was held in Madison. The lecturer pool is drawn partly from members of CTEQ and from experts from throughout the world. One of the hallmarks of the CTEQ schools is the close proximity of students and lecturers. This fosters an atmosphere where the students feel willing to ask any questions of the lecturers. All lectures from the school are available on the CTEQ website (www.phys.psu.edu/~cteq/) and are available for use not only by the students attending the school, but by anyone interested in pedagogical material on QCD.
