Sau Lan Wu facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Sau Lan Wu
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| 吳秀蘭 | |
Sau Lan Wu, October 2012
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| Born | May 11, 1940 |
| Other names | 吴秀兰 |
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| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Particle physics |
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| Thesis | Proton Compton scattering at high energies near the forward direction (1970) |
Sau Lan Wu (Chinese: 吳秀蘭; born May 11, 1940) is a Chinese-American scientist. She studies tiny particles that make up everything around us. She is a top professor of physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Sau Lan Wu helped discover important particles. These include the J/psi particle, which showed that a particle called the charm quark exists. She also helped find the gluon, a particle that "glues" other particles together. More recently, her team at CERN helped discover the Higgs boson. This particle helps explain why other particles have mass.
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Sau Lan Wu's Early Life
Sau Lan Wu was born in Hong Kong in the early 1940s. At that time, Hong Kong was occupied by Japan. In 1960, she went to Vassar College in the United States. She received a full scholarship to study there.
At first, she wanted to be a painter. But then she was inspired by the famous scientist Marie Curie. This made her want to study physics instead. During her time at Vassar, she spent a summer at a science lab called Brookhaven National Laboratory. There, she became very interested in particle physics.
During her first year, she met Jacqueline Kennedy, the First Lady. This happened at an Easter event at the White House. Sau Lan Wu also experienced racial discrimination. This happened when she visited the Supreme Court. She had to choose between "black" or "white" restrooms.
Sau Lan Wu's Education and Work
Sau Lan Wu finished Vassar College in 1963 with a degree in physics. She then earned two more degrees in physics from Harvard University. She got her master's degree in 1964 and her PhD in 1970.
After her studies, she worked at several famous science places. These include MIT, DESY, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is now a special professor of physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Since 1986, she has also been a visiting scientist at CERN. At CERN, she works on the ATLAS experiment with the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
Major Discoveries
Sau Lan Wu has made big contributions to particle physics. She helped discover some of the smallest building blocks of the universe.
Discovering the J/psi Particle
In 1974, Sau Lan Wu was part of a team at MIT. This team was led by Samuel C.C. Ting. They discovered a new particle called the J/psi particle. For this discovery, Samuel C.C. Ting shared the 1976 Nobel Prize in Physics. He shared it with another scientist named Burton Richter.
The MIT team used a particle accelerator at Brookhaven National Laboratory. They shot high-energy proton beams at a target. This created showers of new particles. They found a strong signal of a new, stable particle. This particle decayed into electron-positron pairs. It was the same particle that Richter found at another lab.
Finding the Gluon
Sau Lan Wu was also very important in discovering the gluon. The gluon is a particle that "glues" quarks together. Quarks are tiny particles that make up protons and neutrons. For her work, Sau Lan Wu and her team won the 1995 European Physical Society High Energy and Particle Physics Prize.
The key proof for the gluon's existence came from "three-jet events." These events happen when electrons and positrons crash into each other. They create a quark and an antiquark. Sometimes, an extra gluon is released, creating a third "jet" of particles. In the late 1970s, Wu joined the TASSO collaboration. They worked at the PETRA accelerator at DESY. In 1979, she published a paper about how to find these three-jet events. This work helped prove the existence of the gluon.
The Hunt for the Higgs Boson
Wu's team from Wisconsin was the first American group to join the ATLAS Collaboration at CERN. This happened in 1993. But her search for the Higgs Boson started even earlier. She looked for it at the Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP) at CERN.
With other scientists at LEP, they saw some signs of the Higgs boson. However, the evidence was not strong enough to be a full discovery. They could only say that the Higgs boson, if it existed, had to be heavier than a certain amount. In 2000, CERN closed the LEP collider. This was so they could build the much more powerful Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in its place.
On July 4, 2012, scientists at CERN announced a huge discovery. The ATLAS Collaboration and CMS Collaboration found a new particle. This particle matched what scientists expected the Higgs boson to be. It had a mass of 125 GeV. This discovery was very significant. It meant there was less than a 1 in 3.5 million chance it happened by accident.
This discovery completed the Standard Model of particle physics. The Standard Model explains most of the forces and particles in our Universe. Sau Lan Wu's group from Wisconsin played a big part in this discovery. They worked on two key ways the Higgs boson could break down. These were the Higgs boson decaying into two gamma-rays, and into four leptons.
Mentoring Students
Sau Lan Wu has guided 65 students who were working on their PhDs. Many of these students have become successful scientists and professors themselves.
Awards and Recognition
Sau Lan Wu has received many awards for her important work.
- She won the Outstanding Junior Investigator Award from the U.S. Department of Energy in 1980.
- She received the Romnes Faculty Award from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1981.
- She was named a Hilldale Professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1991.
- She became a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 1992.
- In 1995, she won the High Energy and Particle Physics Prize from the European Physical Society. She shared this award with Paul Söding, Björn Wiik, and Günter Wolf for discovering the gluon.
- She became a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996.
- She was named a Vilas Professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1998.
- Sau Lan Wu has been featured in several books. These books highlight inspiring scientists for young students. Some titles include "Women in Science – 50 fearless pioneers who changed the world" and "Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: 100 Immigrant Women Who Changed the World."
- A small planet, 177770 SaulanWu, was named in her honor in 2022. It was discovered in 2005.
