Re: particles book

[DSCHROEDER@cc.weber.edu]

> I have a student who wants to do an independent honors study project next
> fall on particle physics.
>
> I haven't kept up with the books on this subject.  Does anyone know of a
> recent, good book at the Jr. level?

This is a very good question, and a difficult one.  There are large
parts of particle physics that can be understood well at this level,
but for some reason there doesn't seem to be a fully suitable book.
The main problem, in my opinion, is that the authors of the existing
books are all trying to do too much.  Particle physics is a huge
subject, and no undergraduate is ever going to have time to absorb
it all.

I can think of at least three approaches to an undergrad course in
particle physics:

1.  Try to do everything, at the expense of depth.  Base the course
on Scientific American articles and books at roughly that level.

2.  Take a historical approach, and see how far you get.  Talk about
resonances and the eightfold way and quarks and CP violation and stuff.
Expose the student to the full confusion of the 1960s.

3.  Concentrate on dynamics, starting with QED.  Teach Feynman rules
for calculating cross-sections.  Don't even worry much about the
strong and weak interactions (since there won't be time).

My personal preference would probably be for number 3, but I still
can't recommend a great book.  The book by Griffiths is ok, and from
the preface it sounds like he does something like this in his own
course (omitting some of the more descriptive material from the
early chapters).  One problem is that he just writes down the Feynman
rules (in momentum space) with no attempt to even motivate them.
A more motivated version can almost be gotten from Feynman's book QED,
but he leaves out the formulas.

One nice thing about the Griffiths book is that it's pretty honest:
there's no talking down to the reader or pretending to explain things
when one really hasn't.  That's a big problem with some of the other
books, such as Kane's.

Another problem with the Griffiths book is that he doesn't talk about
experiments much.  One can remedy this by supplementing the book with
some experimental articles from Scientific American, however.
For a serious student, there's also "Experimental Foundations of
Particle Physics" by Cahn and Goldhaber.

Best wishes.  I'll be interested to hear what you decide to do, and
to hear how it goes.

-dan