Brief introduction:

Among all the elementary particles - the fundamental building blocks of all matter - neutrinos are the most abundant in numbers but yet the least understood. Many exciting discoveries had been made recently - we now know neutrinos have mass, and they transform from one type to another through neutrino oscillation. Properties of neutrinos have profound implications in particle physics, cosmology and astrophysics; they may hold the key to explaining why matter dominates anti-matter in the universe, a key condition of our existence. In this talk, the speaker will introduce the tremendous efforts by scientists to chase down these "ghost particles," including recent results from the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment, which represents the first time Hong Kong scientists participate in a major international particle physics experiment.

About the Speaker:

Dr Jason Chun-shing Pun is currently Principal Lecturer at the Department of Physics, The University of Hong Kong. Research interest of Dr Pun includes particle physics, cosmic ray physics, astrophysics of supernovae, supernova remnants and X-ray binaries, and the scientific studies of light pollution. He is one of the founding collaborators of the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment, which used neutrinos emitted from the Daya Bay nuclear reactor complex, about 50 km from Hong Kong, to study the phenomenon of neutrino oscillation.

Brief introduction:

Since ancient time, the idea that all matter is made of indivisible 'atoms' has been embraced by many philosophers and scientists. The properties of these 'atoms' - or elementary particles in modern terminology - are therefore believed to be fundamental ingredients for understanding all physical phenomena in Nature. The recent breakthroughs in elementary particle physics - including the discovery of the Higgs particle (known as 'the God particle' to the public) at the Large hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN and a new type of neutrino oscillation by the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment - mark the beginning of a golden era in fundamental physics. The discoveries are important not only in themselves, but also in opening up a window of opportunities to discover new physics that may revolutionize our understanding of the fundamental structure of matter and the universe! The speaker will introduce at an elementary level these achievements and their implications, as well as a range of new physics that particle physicists will search for.

About the Speaker:

Professor Ming-chung Chu obtained his B.Sc. and PhD degrees both at California Institute of Technology (Caltech). He held research positions at MIT and Caltech before joining the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 1995. His current research interest includes astrophysics, cosmology, and particle physics.