Related papers: Memories of a Theoretical Physicist
In this paper, I discuss my personal journey through one research tradition, that of the resources framework, and how it has evolved over time. In my present work, understanding learners' reasoning in physics in terms of the construction of…
Despite its amazing quantitative successes and contributions to revolutionary technologies, physics currently faces many unsolved mysteries ranging from the meaning of quantum mechanics to the nature of the dark energy that will determine…
This contribution to the book in honour of J.S. Bell will probably differ from the remaining ones, in particular since only a part of it will be devoted to specific technical arguments. In fact I have considered appropriate to share with…
Outlooks of particle physics researchers on their careers and the general challenges in establishing their careers over different career stages are surveyed using a questionnaire distributed to participants in an ERC-funded research…
This paper addresses issues related to the process of informal socialization into physics, particularly for senior graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. Many physicists' careers are built on the relationships they have and develop…
This review article is the second part of the project ``Selected Topics of Social Physics". The first part has been devoted to equilibrium systems. The present part considers nonequilibrium systems. The style of the paper combines the…
Over the last 20+ years, experimentalists have presented tantalizing hints of physics beyond the standard model, but nothing definitive. With the wealth of data from experiments, in particular the collider experiments, it is imperative that…
As part of a longitudinal study into identity development in upper-level physics students, we used a phenomenographic research method to examine students' perceptions of what it means to be a physicist. The results revealed four different…
This chapter sets the stage for the rest of the book by exploring the role of intuition as a tool to deepen understanding in Einsteinian physics. Drawing on examples from the history of general relativity, we argue that the development of…
Brief recollections by the author about how he contributed to the production of the Feynman Lectures in Physics
Motivated by issues in string theory and M-theory, we provide a pedestrian introduction to automorphic forms and theta series, emphasizing examples rather than generality.
The $17^\text{th}$ edition of the international workshop on top quark physics featured a diverse set of outstanding results. This note is an attempt to summarize the workshop from the experimental perspective and suggest ways forward for…
This manuscript must be intended as an informal review of the research works carried out during three years of PhD. "Informal" in the sense that technical proofs are often omitted (they can be found in the papers) as one could do for a…
Too often, physics students are beset by feelings of failure and isolation rather than experiencing the creative joys of discovery that physics has to offer. This dissertation research was founded on the desire of a teacher to make physics…
These lecture notes are intended to give a modest impulse to anyone willing to start or pursue a journey into the theory of Vertex Algebras by reading one of Kac's or Lepowsky-Li's books. Therefore, the primary goal is to provide required…
I present the reconstruction of the involvement of Karl Popper in the community of physicists concerned with foundations of quantum mechanics, in the 1980s. At that time Popper gave active contribution to the research in physics, of which…
A popular scientific contribution should not contradict any established facts and ought to be understandable. I complied with both these requirements and am offering a sufficiently full introduction to probability theory. Furthermore, I…
Did time begin at a Big Bang? Will the present expansion of the universe last for a finite or infinite time? These questions sound philosophical but are becoming, now in the twenty-first century, central to the scientific study of…
This is the second in a series of papers intended to provide a basic overview of some of the major ideas in particle physics. Part I [arXiv:0810.3328] was primarily an algebraic exposition of gauge theories. We developed the group theoretic…
When a mountaineer is ascending one of the great peaks of the Himalayas she knows that an entirely new vista awaits her at the top, whose ramifications will be known only after she gets there. Her immediate goal though, is to tackle the…