Unicamp's Institute for Advanced Studies (IdEA) began this Tuesday (3) the activities of the Resident Scientist's “Cesar Lattes” Program with the arrival of Italian physicist Francesco Vissani. Professor at the Gran Sasso Science Institute (GSSI), he is teaching a mini-course aimed at researchers in the area of Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics and will give two scientific dissemination lectures for a non-specialized audience.
Master from the University of Pisa and PhD from the Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati (SISSA), in Trieste, Vissani was the first scientist awarded the Occhialini Medal (2008), an initiative of the Società Italiana di Fisica (SIF) in partnership with the Institute of Physics (IOP), from the United Kingdom. Director of research at the Gran Sasso National Laboratories of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), he coordinated the doctoral course in Astroparticle Physics at the GSSI from 2012 to 2018.
Back in Brazil for the third time, Vissani has an important job as a researcher in the area of neutrinos and as a science popularizer. In 2016, he created the Asimov Prize, aimed at authors of books popularizing science and scientific culture with a focus on young readers in Italian. “I believe in collaboration between scientists and high school teachers, and that is the reason why I created the Asimov Prize in Italy”, explains the physicist. “This is an initiative that reaches several thousand high school students and a few hundred Italian secondary schools. It is a very nice thing and I am very happy that it is supported by INFN and GSSI, to whom I warmly thank.”
The suggestion of Vissani's name to launch the new program was made by physicist Anderson Fauth, deputy coordinator of IdEA and professor at the “Gleb Wataghin” Institute of Physics (IFGW). “I feel honored by the fact that I have many colleagues and friends at Unicamp and it is a great pleasure to return. I have always enjoyed the time I spent in the country, so I am particularly happy with this invitation and very grateful to Professor Anderson Fauth”, says the Italian physicist.
Fauth explains that Vissani was appointed by IdEA's Technical-Administrative Council as the first resident scientist due to his international prominence in the area of neutrino physics and astrophysics. Furthermore, the Italian is the research director of the largest underground neutrino laboratory in the world, the Gran Sasso National Laboratory, at INFN. “The advances in knowledge of neutrino physics in recent years have been enormous, and the discoveries were the subject of two Nobel awards, in 2002 and 2015”, highlights the deputy coordinator of IdEA.
“In short, neutrino physics and astrophysics is a very important and current topic in science so that we can understand more about the nature of matter. Unicamp has researchers working in this area, and the mini-course should provide a high-level environment for discussions about current and future research projects”, says Fauth.
Agenda
The Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics course, which started this Tuesday (3), will consist of eight classes, in English, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, at IdEA headquarters. Focusing on postgraduate students, it will cover history, particle description, low and high energy neutrinos and the future of neutrino physics and astrophysics, among other topics. The lectures “Why does the Sun shine?”, on September 11, and “Vampires, Ghosts, Mutants: Metaphors about Neutrinos”, on September 25th, will take place in the Auditorium of Unicamp's Cesar Lattes Central Library, with simultaneous translation, and registration is open.
In the first lecture, the characteristics of the Sun will be described and scientific predictions about the end of fuel burning and extinction of the star will be discussed. Three hypotheses about solar heat will be addressed: chemical reactions, the effect of gravitational force and the energy of the atom nucleus. Furthermore, Vissani will explain the nuclear reactions that occur on the Sun and their experimental validations. “It's the story of how, in the last century, we came to understand the way the Sun works. It has some funny aspects, like mistakes made by famous physicists. It is incredible to see how our studies of nuclear and particle physics have allowed us to understand the nature of the Sun and other stars. Furthermore, it is an open story, the final words of which have not yet been written.”
In the second presentation at Unicamp, Vissani will talk about why, among all known particles, the neutrino stands out due to its strange behavior. In 1930, when the neutrino was proposed, the Austrian physicist Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958) was embarrassed to assume the existence of a “ghostly” particle. According to Vissani, because he takes over the energy of other particles and does not have a symmetrical image in the mirror, he has also been called “vampire”. The lecture also intends to discuss the reasons for these lexical choices and whether the use of these expressions is really useful for understanding the subject.
Cesar Lattes (1924-2005), from Paraná, after whom IdEA's Resident Scientist Program is named, etched his name in the history of science as one of the greatest physicists in Brazil. Graduated in 1943 from the Faculty of Philosophy, Sciences and Letters at the University of São Paulo (USP), he became interested in experimental physics, dedicating himself to the study of cosmic rays. A full professor in the Department of Physics at USP since 1959, Lattes helped create, in 1967, the Physics Institute at Unicamp, where he retired in 1986.
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