NUS Module Review: PC4245 Particle Physics

Description:	This is an introductory course on the fundamental constituents of matter and their basic interactions; important concepts and principles, recent important experiments, underlying theoretical tools and calculation techniques in elementary particles physics will be expounded. The topics covered are: basic properties of elementary particles and the standard model, relativistic kinematics; symmetries: isospin and SU(3), quark model; parity and CP violation; Feynman diagrams and rules; quantum electrodynamics; cross sections and lifetimes: deep inelastic scattering; and introductory gauge theories and unified models. This module is mainly targeted at physics majors.
Credits:	4
Workload:	3 lecture hours per week 1 tutorial hours per week 0 lab hours per week 1 hours for projects, assignments, fieldwork etc per week 5 hours for preparatory work by a student per week 10 Total

Personal Experience:
I feel like catching up finally to the frontier of physics 30 years back, but to catch up those 30 years requires really speciallisation in this area. I like the way Feymann make his rules about how QED works... And you don't need QED to know this module.... it's not too applied Physics either, you need to apply the theory to get to deduce from new theories+ experimental facts to find out the Standard Model..... A very cool module I say! A must take for anyone serious in Theorectical Physics (and in uniting the quantum and the gravity).

Teaching Staff:
A very nice and patient Prof. Dr. Teo Kian Boon is. You might get lost in his speed but be sure to catch him and tell him to go slow if that happens and you are lost. But to be able to cover so much in one module is just plain amazing!

Workload:
Same as almost all level 4 Physics Theory modules, it covers the tutorials in class and have 2 term test each 15% and a 70% final term test. It's bearable but beware of the heavy tutorials, and make sure you do it to get good grades in the term tests. Just read, understand, and do then you should get an A.

Content:
Quite heavy in Maths and Problem solving, but also essential for any good foundation in Particle Physics, after this course, you can read the graduate Particle Physics and Electroweak theory, Higgs Mechanism etc.......(which was covered briefly)....