Career Awards advance research for Jefferson Lab researchers

Two researchers affiliated with the U.S. Department of Energy's Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility have received 2017 Early Career Research Program awards from the DOE's Office of Science.

Ted Rogers, who holds a joint appointment position with Jefferson Lab and Old Dominion University, and Justin Stevens, who holds a bridge appointment position with Jefferson Lab and William & Mary, were among the 59 winners recently announced by DOE. The award program "supports the development of individual research programs of outstanding scientists early in their careers" and provides $750,000 of research support over five years.

Rogers plans to apply the award to extend the theory that enables more detailed understanding of the building blocks of protons: quarks and gluons. Specifically, he aims to fill in the holes in a theory of factorization to allow experimenters to interpret their experiments in terms of quarks and gluons in greater detail than had traditionally been possible and potentially enabling a more detailed understanding of quark movement in the proton.

Read more about Rogers' research here: Scientist Takes Aim at Wiggling Quarks.

Stevens plans to apply the award toward the gluonic excitations experiment that is taking place at Jefferson Lab. The GlueX experiment aims to produce hybrid mesons, which are never-before-seen particles that can help scientists gain a better understanding of the strong nuclear force that binds quarks into protons and neutrons, the more familiar components of the atom.

Read more about Stevens' research here: Early Career Award allows physicist to probe mysteries of QCD and strange mesons.

These awards represent two proposals of only 59 that were chosen from about 700 for an award. Rogers and Stevens will each receive, on average, $150,000 each year for the next five years to support their work.

Contact: Kandice Carter, Jefferson Lab Communications Office, 757-269-7263, kcarter@jlab.org.

Provided by Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility