Giovanna Benzoni

INFN sezione di Milano
Dipartimento di Fisica
Via Celoria 16
20133 Milano
Italy

e-mail: Giovanna.Benzoni@mi.infn.it
homepage: http://www.mi.infn.it/~benzoni/index.html

Education

• May 2004: Post-Doc position at INFN Milano
  Subject: La spettroscopia gamma dei nuclei esotici (esperimento RISING)
  gamma spectroscopy of exotic nuclei (exp. RISING)
• 8 Gennaio 2004 : Defence of PhD thesis
  Title: gamma-ray emission in warm ¹⁶³Er and ¹²⁶Ba nuclei: selection rules and deformations.
  Advisors: A.Bracco, Bonifacio.
  Referees: B.Herskind, G.La Rana
  
• November 2003:Admission to final defense of PhD thesis
• Nov.-Dec 2001: Training program on the FRS, GSI, Darmstadt (D)
  Supervisors: H.J.Wollersheim, M.Hellstrom
• November 2000: Start of PhD. studies at "Scuola di dottorato in Fisica, Astrofisica e Fisica Applicata"
  Reasearch interest: Nuclear and Particle Physics, gamma spectroscopy.
  Advisors: A.Bracco
• 1994-1999: Undergraduate studies in Physics, Universita' degli Studi di Milano
  30-05-2000: Degree in Physics: 110/110 cum Laude
  Title of the Thesis: Decadimento del nucleo superdeformato ¹⁴³Eu attraverso la risonanza gigante di dipolo.
  Advisors: A.Bracco, S.Leoni
• 1989-1994: Scientific High School, Liceo Scientifico Statale "E.Fermi", Cantu'(Co) Italy
  06-07-1994: Leaving exam: 52/60

Languages and Computer skills

• Windows(98,2000,XP), Unix (Sun Solaris, Digital) and Linux (Red Hat) operative systems
• MS Office (Word, Excel,PowerPoint....)
• C, Fortran 77/90, Turbo Pascal, Perl, LaTex

• Italian (mother tongue)
• Fluent English, both written and oral
• Basics of Spanish

Teaching activities

• Sep.-Dec.2000: Scienze della Materia (Science) teaching at professional high-school ITC "E.Tosi"
  Busto Arsizio (Va)
• a.a.2001/2002, II semester: Assistant for " Ricerca Operativa Probabilita' e Statistica" (Operative research, probability and statistics) for undergraduate students in Computer Science
  prof. Archetti, Universita' degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca
• a.a.2003/2004, I semester: Tutor for "Fisica Generale"(Physics) for undergraduate students in Computer Science
  prof.Camera, Universita' degli Studi di Milano
• a.a.2003/2004, II semester: Tutor for "Fisica Generale"(Physics) for undergraduate students in Biology
  prof. Leoni,Universita' degli Studi di Milano

Working experiences

• 1994-2000: stand operator at Macef exhibitions (feb. and sep. editions) for "Il Portico", Vigo (E)
• Summer 2000: Group leader for summer school students (aged 15-18) in Edimburgh (UK)
• since 1994 : private lessons in Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry for high-school and undergraduate students

Research interests

brief summary

The experimental research activity is focused on the study of nuclear properties at extreme conditions of temperature and angular momentum (4-5 MeV and 70 ħ). The tipical reactions used to produce such critical conditions are fusion-evaporation reactions of heavy ions. The decay of the compound nucleus is analyzed using high resolution 4-pi gamma-arrays like EUROBALL and GAMMASPHERE, often coupled to ancillary detector, as HECTOR and the InnerBall.
Currently I am also involved in the RISING experiment to serach for the pigmy resonance in the nucleus ⁶⁸Ni to be performed at the FRS in GSI in spring 2005.
One of the topics of my Ph.D. thesis was to study the order-to-chaos transition going from ordered rotational structures close to the yrast line to chaotic motion typical of the compound system. This topic was addressed by studying the conservation of the selection rules on the K-quantum number as a function of the excitation energy at high spin in the nucleus ¹⁶³Er, using the fluctuation analysis thechniques.
Another topic of my PhD project was the population of hyper-deformed structures. This analysis was performed on the ¹²⁶Ba, populated by the reaction ⁶⁴Ni+⁶⁴Ni at two different beam energies:255-261 MeV. The analysis of the E2 continuum has evidenced the presence of a Jacobi-shape transition, considered as the precoursor for such highly deformed structures.
A full calibration of the multiplicity filter, InnerBall, was also performed in order to transform the raw info. of fold into spin.
The analysis of the high energy gamma-ray spectra to study the decay of the GDR is still in progress.
The role of the GDR on the population of SD configurations, studied in the nucleus ¹⁴³Eu, was the topic of my undergraduate thesis.
I also took part to many different experiments aiming at the study of the wobbling motion and of the evolution of the GDR width as a function of the temperature.

list of Publications

see link papers

conferences and schools

see link conferences and schools