Fest colloquium to celebrate the award of the Max Planck Medal to Prof. Andrzej J. Buras
Abstract: After the completion of the Standard Model (SM) through the Higgs discovery in 2012 particle physicists are waiting for the discovery of new particles either directly with the help of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN or indirectly through quantum fluctuations causing certain rare processes with the change of quark flavour to occur at different rates than predicted by the SM. While the latter route is very challenging, requiring very precise theory and experiment, it allows a much higher resolution of short distance scales than it is possible with the help of the LHC. In fact in the coming flavour precision era, in which the accuracy of the measurements of rare processes and of the relevant theory calculations will be significantly increased, there is a good chance that we may get an insight into the scales as short as 10^-21 m (Zeptouniverse) corresponding to energy scale of 200 TeV or even shorter distance scales. The main strategies for reaching this goal including the most recent developments will be presented. We will also summarise the present status of deviations from SM predictions for a number of flavour observables and list prime candidates for new particles responsible for these so-called anomalies. A short outlook for coming years will be given.
16:15 Laudatio by Prof. Dr. Gerhard Buchalla
16:25 Laudatio by Dr. Ulrich Haisch
16:35 Laudatio by Prof. Dr. Andreas Weiler
16:45 Fest colloquium by Prof. Dr. Andrzej J. Buras
17:45 Reception
In the scientific community, Andrzej J. Buras is internationally recognised for his outstanding contributions to the applied quantum field theory of fundamental interactions, especially to the phenomenology of the Standard Model of particle physics. Of particular influence were his work on the asymmetry between matter and antimatter and the quantitative effects of the strong interaction in weak and rare decays bound by quark-antiquark pairs.
Andrzej J. Buras studied physics in Warsaw. He received his doctorate in 1972 at the Niels Bohr Institute (Copenhagen). Post-doctoral studies at CERN (Geneva), Fermilab (Chicago) and SLAC (Stanford University) were followed by a position at the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich. In 1988 he was appointed to the Department of Theoretical Particle Physics at the Physics Department of the Technical University of Munich. After his retirement in 2012, he continued his research there and at the TUM Institute for Advanced Study as TUM Emeritus of Excellence, supported by an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council. In 2020, Andrzej J. Buras received the Max Planck Medal for his outstanding contributions to applied quantum field theory of fundamental interactions, especially in the field of flavor physics and quantum chromodynamics. The Max Planck Medal is the DPG’s highest honor for outstanding achievements in the field of theoretical physics.
