This book aims at providing a solid basis for the education of the next generation of researchers in hot, dense QCD (Quantum ChromoDynamics) matter. This is a rapidly growing field at the interface of the smallest, i.e. subnuclear physics, and the largest scales, namely astrophysics and cosmology. The extensive lectures presented here are based on the material used at the training school of the European COST action THOR (Theory of hot matter in relativistic heavy-ion collisions). The book is divided in three parts covering ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions, several aspects related to QCD, and simulations of QCD and heavy-ion collisions. The scientific tools and methods discussed provide graduate students with the necessary skills to understand the structure of matter under extreme conditions of high densities, temperatures, and strong fields in the collapse of massive stars or a few microseconds after the big bang. In addition to the theory, the set of lectures presents hands-on material that includes an introduction to simulation programs for heavy-ion collisions, equations of state, and transport properties.

This thesis describes a high-quality, high-precision method for the data analysis of an interesting elementary particle reaction. The data was collected at the Japanese B-meson factory KEKB with the Belle detector, one of the most successful large-scale experiments worldwide. CP violation is a subtle quantum effect that makes the world look different when simultaneously left and right and matter and antimatter are exchanged. This being a prerequisite for our own world to have developed from the big bang, there are only a few experimental indications of such effects, and their detection requires very intricate techniques. The discovery of CP violation in B meson decays garnered Kobayashi and Maskawa, who had predicted these findings as early as 1973, the 2008 Nobel prize in physics. This thesis describes in great detail what are by far the best measurements of branching ratios and CP violation parameters in two special reactions with two charm mesons in the final state. It presents an in-depth but accessible overview of the theory, phenomenology, experimental setup, data collection, Monte Carlo simulations, (blind) statistical data analysis, and systematic uncertainty studies.

This 2nd edition is an extensive update of "B Decays?. The revisions are necessary because of the extensive amount of new data and new theoretical ideas. This book reviews what is known about b-quark decays and also looks at what can be learned in the future.The importance of this research area is increasing, as evidenced by the approval of the luminosity upgrade for CESR and the asymmetric B factories at SLAC and KEK, and the possibility of experiments at hadron colliders.The key experimental observations made thus far, measurement of the lifetimes of the different B species, B0-B0 mixing, the discovery of ?Penguin? mediated decays, and the extraction of the CKM matrix elements Vub and Vcb from semileptonic decays, as well as more mundane results, are described in great detail by the experimentalists who have been closely involved with making the measurements. Theoretical progress in understanding b-quark decays using HQET and lattice gauge techniques are described by theorists who have developed and used these techniques.Synthesizing the experimental and theoretical information, several articles discuss the implications for the ?Standard Model? and how further tests can be done using measurements of CP violation in the B system.

The twelfth-century French poet Chrétien de Troyes is a major figure in European literature. His courtly romances fathered the Arthurian tradition and influenced countless other poets in England as well as on the continent. Yet because of the difficulty of capturing his swift-moving style in translation, English-speaking audiences are largely unfamiliar with the pleasures of reading his poems. Now, for the first time, an experienced translator of medieval verse who is himself a poet provides a translation of Chrétien’s major poem, Yvain, in verse that fully and satisfyingly captures the movement, the sense, and the spirit of the Old French original. Yvain is a courtly romance with a moral tenor; it is ironic and sometimes bawdy; the poetry is crisp and vivid. In addition, the psychological and the socio-historical perceptions of the poem are of profound literary and historical importance, for it evokes the emotions and the values of a flourishing, vibrant medieval past.

This thesis describes the thorough analysis of the rare B meson decay into φ K* on data taken by the Belle Collaboration at the B-meson-factory KEKB over 10 years. This reaction is very interesting, because it in principle allows the observation of CP-violation effects. In the Standard Model however, no CP violation in this reaction is expected. An observation of CP asymmetries thus immediately implies new physics. This thesis presents an amplitude analysis of this decay and the search for CP violation in detail and discusses methods to solve related problems: The quantification of multivariate dependence and the improvement of numeric evaluation speed of normalization integrals in amplitude analysis. In addition it provides an overview of the theory, experimental setup, (blind) statistical data analysis and estimation of systematic uncertainties.