The 11th Conference on the Intersections of Particle and Nuclear Physics (CIPANP 2012), will be held in St. Petersburg, FL, May 29 - June 3, 2012. The CIPANP is a triennial series that focuses on topics of interest to elementary particle physicists, nuclear physicists and physicists with interests in particle/nuclear astrophysics. As this conference series has developed since 1984, the overlap of these areas has markedly increased. For example, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is exploring both elementary particle physics and heavy ion physics, with the ALICE Detector particularly focusing on studies of lead-ion collisions. Explorations of the neutrino sector have attracted both traditional nuclear and traditional particle physicists for measurements of solar neutrinos, reactor neutrinos, long baseline neutrinos and double beta decay. There is also extensive overlap between particle physics and nuclear physics in both theoretical ideas and experimental methods. The CIPANP series has facilitated both formal and informal exchanges of information among physicists working in the particle physics, nuclear physics and nuclear/particle astrophysics sectors.
This award provides support for junior scientists, especially members of underrepresented groups, who otherwise have no means to attend the conference. Participation in CIPANP 2012 by younger scientists will stimulate their interest and enthusiasm, increase their knowledge and broaden their network of contacts.
This award funded conference fees and some travel for young participants attending the meeting, the Conference at the Intersections of Particle and Nuclear Physics (CIPANP) in May of 2012. The conference is unique in that it brings together high energy physicists with Nuclear Physicists for plenary talks, parallel sessions, and poster presentations in both fields and in particular in the overlap region between each field. Young scientists often do not have as much funding available to them to attend conferences. The NSF grant was specifically targeted to fund those young scientists, early in their career, in need of funding to attend this conferenece. The CIPANP conference is held once every three years since 1984 with the philosophy that particle and nuclear physicists should interact more to share results and collaborate on techniques to perform physics measurements. Many of the same questions and challeneges emerge in both fields. Meeting together to discuss these questions and challeneges should help both fields progress. The conference also hosted a public lecture on Energy Research given by Ernest Moniz. The public lecture was well advertised and well attended. The goal of this proposal was so that both the conference participants and the public lecture attendees benefit from the science presented at the confernece and public lecture.
