Symmetry factor

Today MiniBooNE collaboration announced its results during the special seminar at Fermilab (you could have seen the live broadcast from the Fermilab server here). The old LSND result was NOT confirmed, although their low energy data looks funny (this is ascribed to non-oscillation physics). Therefore, all experimental data point to the standard picture of three light neutrinos. Standard Model withstood another test… too bad. “Something interesting” in the rumor was reffering to SM confirmation. Here is the Fermilab press release.

I wanted to tell you about the project HiSchool DiSCo. This is a project that I started almost a year ago here at WSU as part of outreach effort supported by my CAREER award. The idea was to set up a network of (Linux-powered) computers at local high schools, both in Detroit and suburbs.

Why? Well, the way high performance computing is going nowdays, scientists and engineers will be using powerful grids of computers to solve computational problems. In fact, data from the highest-energy-to-be accelerator in the world, the LHC, will be processed using Grid technology using computers all over the world. There are many other exmples in physics and astrophysics (ex. LSST). Also, grids can be used for drug design, data minig, etc… The idea of Grid computing is very similar to electric power networks (”grids”): users of electricity can access electric power without actually wonderting about which power plant that energy is coming from. So, IMHO, its the way of the future in high performance computing.

Now, how can I interest high school students in this cool technology? And, generally, excite them about science and engineering careers? And make them think that physics is not boring? Certainly, no one will allow them to play with, say, the LHC Grid. This is where the HighSchool DiSCo comes in. Basically, it’s like a “toy grid.” Those computers in high schools would be used for the dual purposes of teaching high school students the basics of Linux/Windows administration and scientific computational methods and as a commodity cluster for high energy physics computations (in my case, analytical calculations of pQCD corrections). An many other things.

NSF thought that it is a good idea and funded a research assistant to work on this project. And that’s where we got stuck — no money for computers to place in schools!!! I was trying to get some private money and, naturally, contacted our University Development Office. They were “helpful” by enthusiastically agreeing to help, sitting on a proposal for almost a year doing nothing. Blew all private foundations’ deadlines without even letting me know… Of course, who cares about $30-50K when one can work on funding for a new building for several milllion $$$… At the end, I even had to spend money I got as part of one of the local WSU “outstanding faculty” awards to buy some computers… But still, no money for computers at schools! This is how the project looks like now, at least the WSU part of the cluster:

Maybe someone has some ideas of how to get this thing fully-funded? Or can offer funding? I’d appreciate the info…

So, what’s going to happen on April 11? Well according to rumors and some better-supported information, one of the Fermilab’s neutrino experiments, the MiniBooNE, will (finally, after a year of promises…) announce their results on nu_mu to nu_e oscillations.

What’s the big deal? Well, accroding to the Standard Model, there are only three types of neutrinos. Several neutrino oscillations experiments measured differences of masses of neutrino mass eigenstates squared (let’s call them Delta m^2_ij). A simple sum rule than says that if I take all measured Delta m^2_ij and sum them up, I’d get zero. Purely mathematically. Now, if I actually do that (i.e. with actual experimental results), I get a number that is far from zero. And the problem is a result from an old experiment called LSND.

Now I have two options. The boring one says that LSND result is wrong. It happens (not only to theorists…). The exciting one says that there are not three, but four (!) types of neutrinos. But the forth one is weird, it does not interact with anything, i.e. it is sterile. So MiniBooNE results will check LSND with either exciting or boring conclusion…

In other words, according to Maury Goodman:

*** MiniBooNE and boxing
Results of a short-baseline neutrino oscillation search from the MiniBooNE experiment at Fermilab are scheduled to be discussed at a seminar at Fermilab on April 11. MiniBooNE is sensitive to numu to nue oscillations at the same value of L/E as a reported signal from the LSND experiment at Los Alamos. I expect them to show the presence or absence of an excess of low energy electrons (below 2 GeV). The “blind” analysis has been done with a large amount of neutrino running. MiniBooNE is currently running with anti-neutrinos, and they got to do systematic checks with two unexpected antineutrino beam configurations for a few months. Ten metal plate were designed to provide an opportunity to shorten the length of the decay pipe and two of them fell down, inadvertently partially blocking part of that pipe. Repairs will be done 4/11.

Well explained. The rumor part of it is that they (MiniBooNE) see “something interesting.” One just have to check if they ordered champagne… although it might not be quite appropriate in light of recent unfortunate events at CERN…

Update (4/11/07): Standard Model withstood another test… no champagne, no trips to Sweden…