Finn Stokes

My current research focus is the muon magnetic moment, a quantity that has puzzled physicists for decades. A longstanding discrepancy between theoretical predictions and experimental measurements of this quantity hints at new physics beyond the standard model. In 2021 we used lattice QCD calculations on supercomputers to rule out most of the prevailing explanations, leaving only a few possibilities. My current research program aims to dramatically increase the precision of that calculation, and provide detailed insight into the origin of the disagreement. Ultimately the I hope to answer once and for all if the discrepancy indicates new physics, and what it must look like. This will guide ongoing national and international searches for new theories that will underpin the next generation of physics research.

More broadly, I am driven to understand the nature of the strong nuclear force and the phenomena that arise from it. I have a particular interest in hadronic states and their interactions, and how these give rise to the resonances observed in experiment. In 2015 I developed the groundbreaking Parity Expanded Variational Analysis (PEVA) technique, allowing the clean isolation of baryon excited states in lattice QCD. This technique will be instrumental for future studies of baryon excited state structure, and has formed the foundation for an ongoing research program investigating these states at the University of Adelaide that I remain heavily involved with.

I also have a keen interest in visualisations of lattice QCD, and the qualitative insight they can provide into the structure of the QCD vacuum.