Anselm G. Vossen
Assistant Professor of Physics

In Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), the theory of the strong interactions, the nucleon emerges as a strongly interacting, relativistic bound state of almost massless quarks and gluons.
Fifty years of experimental investigations into the nucleon's internal structure have provided remarkable insight into quark and gluon dynamics. However, many outstanding questions remain.
For example, the origin of the spin of the proton is still eludes us and many other properties of the nucleon cannot yet be derived from first order calculations. Even fundamental aspects like a quantitative understanding of the  origin of the mass of the nuclei (and thus most of the visible mass in the universe) as well as the confinement of quarks into hadrons remain outside our current understanding.

My research approaches these questions from two sides. At the newly upgraded Jefferson Lab facility, we use electron proton scattering data to map out the 3D dynamics of the nucleon. We are in particular interested in polarized probes that are sensitive to spin-orbit coupling in the proton wavefunction.
And at the newly constructed Belle II experiment, we use electron-positron annihilation data, to study how hadrons emergy from initial quarks. We are in particular interested how the quantum numbers of the inital quark, like spin, are expressed in the final state hadrons.

My group also works on precision tests of the flavor sector of the standard model at the intensity frontier. To this end we study the properties of B meson detected with the Belle II experiment.

Current Research Interests

My field of research is Experimental Nuclear Physics.
I am in particular interested in the imaging of quark and gluons inside the protons to understand how their dynamics influence the property of visible mass.
I work at experiments at Jefferson Lab in Virginia and at KEK in Japan.
At Jefferson Lab we use electron scattering experiments to probe the proton, whereas at KEK we use electron-positron annihilation to study how quarks form particles that we can detect and how we can learn about the quantum numbers of the initial quarks from the final state particles.
Together, these experiments can tell us about the quark and gluon content of the proton.

Office Hours

by appointment

Current Appointments & Affiliations

Contact Information

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