Doctoral Program: Hadrons in Vacuum, Nuclei and Stars

The main focus of the Doctoral Program "Hadrons in Vacuum, Nuclei and Stars" is a deeper understanding of Quantum Chromodynamics and the properties of hadrons. The Doctoral Program focuses on theoretical investigations whereas the partner Universities in Basel and in Tübingen contribute also to experimental hadron and astroparticle physics research. This close contact to the experimental hadron physics will have direct impact on the theoretical research in Graz. The Graz program has the following scientific long-term goals:

* structure of the QCD vacuum, axial anomaly
* confinement scenarios
* mechanism of dynamical chiral symmetry breaking and generation of hadronic masses
* structure of the nucleon
* exotic hadrons like e.g. glueballs and hybrids
* excitation spectrum of hadrons and properties of excited hadrons
* role of strange quarks in vacuum and hadron structure * exclusive hadronic reations
* temperature and density dependence of hadron properties

It is planned to combine different methods (analytical and computational, perturbative and non-perturbative) for the theoretical investigations in order to improve the quality of available theoretical techniques.