Conveners
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 1
- William Horowitz (University of Cape Town)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 2
- Azwinndini Muronga (Nelson Mandela University)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 3
- Tshegofatso Tshipi (Sol Plaatje University)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 4
- Sam van Leuven (University of the Witwatersrand)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 5
- William Horowitz (University of Cape Town)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 6
- Azwinndini Muronga (Nelson Mandela University)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 8
- Sam van Leuven (University of the Witwatersrand)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 9
- William Horowitz (University of Cape Town)
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Session 7
- Joseph Anosh (Witwatersrand)
Theoretical and Computational Physics
- There are no conveners in this block
Theoretical and Computational Physics: Division group meeting
- There are no conveners in this block
Theoretical and Computational Physics
- There are no conveners in this block
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Prof. Azwinndini Muronga (Nelson Mandela University)08/07/2025, 09:20Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Core-collapse supernovae involve extreme conditions where gravity, nuclear physics, and shock hydrodynamics interact to drive the explosive disruption of a massive star. In this study, we investigate shock wave propagation using a one-dimensional piston-driven model as a proxy for the bounce shock that forms during core collapse. A polytropic equation of state is employed to represent...
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417. Piston-Driven Shock Wave Test Problem for Validating Magnetohydrodynamic Models in AstrophysicsMagdeline Seabi (Nelson Mandela University)08/07/2025, 09:40Track D1 - AstrophysicsOral Presentation
Computational magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) provides a powerful framework for modelling matter in extreme environments where both fluid dynamics and magnetic fields are critical. These conditions arise in heavy-ion collisions (HIC) and astrophysical events like core-collapse supernovae (CCSNe). To ensure solver accuracy, we validate our RMHD model using a piston-driven shock wave test problem,...
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Coleridge Faraday (University of Cape Town)08/07/2025, 10:00Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
The quark-gluon plasma (QGP) is formed when protons and neutrons melt at temperatures over 100,000 times hotter than the Sunโs core. These conditions are achieved in high-energy heavy-ion collisions, such as those involving lead or gold nuclei at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). More recently, signs suggest that small droplets of QGP may also form...
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Geoff Beck (University of the Witwatersrand)08/07/2025, 10:50Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
The wave nature of particles is a notoriously unintuitive feature of quantum theories. However, it is often deemed essential, due to material particles exhibiting diffraction and interference. Troublingly, Lande and Levy-Leblond have shown that de Broglie wavelengths are not relativistically covariant, making any such wave properties physically inconsistent. In this work we explore whether...
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Luyanda Mazwi (University of Johannesburg)08/07/2025, 11:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Neutrino flavour oscillation offers a valuable avenue to probe physics beyond the Standard Model. Despite significant progress, key questions remain unresolved particularly the neutrino mass hierarchy and the constraints on parameters governing flavour oscillation, such as the mixing angle θ23 and the Charge-Parity (CP) violating phase δCP. In this study, we...
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Dr Lucas Vusi Ndala (University of South Africa)08/07/2025, 11:30Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
We use the Continuum Discretized Coupled Channels (CDCC) method to study in detail the similarities and differences between neutron and proton halo breakup cross sections including total, nuclear, and
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Coulomb contributions in the breakup reactions of 8Bโ7Be+p and 8Beโ7Be+n on various target nuclei (28Si, 120Sn and 236U). Our preliminary results reveal that the neutron halo breakup cross... -
William Horowitz (University of Cape Town)08/07/2025, 14:40Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Modern classical and quantum physics is based on Hamilton's variational action principle. Holonomic constraints, constraints that depend on coordinates alone, can be incorporated into a modified Hamilton's variational action principle through the use of Lagrange multipliers. Non-holonomic constraints, those that depend on coordinates and velocity, such as rolling without slipping, have for...
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Obiageli Ezenwachukwu08/07/2025, 15:00Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
In this contribution basis sets derived from Daubechies wavelets scaling functions[1] are used to solve the one-dimensional Schrรถdinger equation on the interval $[-x_{\rm max}:x_{\rm max}]$. We present the results for
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a) the harmonic oscillator and b) the Morse potential as function of the number $N$ of intervals. Double logarithmic fits of the energy error against $N$ are also shown. Fast... -
Jarryd Bath (University of Pretoria)08/07/2025, 15:20Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
We present a novel regularization scheme in quantum field theory, analytic regularization. In our regularization scheme, we modify the action such that convergence is guaranteed before quantization. In particular, using Riesz derivatives, we analytically continue the power of the kinetic term in the action leading to an analytic continuation of the power of the propagator. This power is then...
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Dr Anosh Joseph (University of the Witwatersrand)08/07/2025, 16:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
One of the significant challenges in superstring theory is understanding how the extra dimensions of space might shrink down to sizes we cannot see - something called dynamical compactification. The type IIB matrix model is a robust mathematical framework that aims to describe this process in ten dimensions. In this model, space itself is expected to emerge from the behavior of large matrices,...
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PEDRO DINIS ORNELAS (University of the Witwatersrand)08/07/2025, 16:30Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Topology has emerged as a fundamental feature across diverse physical systems, from cosmology and condensed matter to high-energy physics and wave dynamics. Yet, despite its broad relevance, topological studies have largely been confined to low-dimensional classical systems. Here, using entangled quantum states, we uncover a vast landscape of diverse topological maps derived from high...
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Abinash Swain (University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, SA)08/07/2025, 16:50Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Over the last two decades, automorphic forms have emerged as encoders of the mathematical principles underlying the organization of information and microstates in quantum gravity. Perhaps their most significant appearance in this context lies in the counting of black hole microscopic states. The detection and classification of modular formsโand the analysis of their modular propertiesโthus...
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Dumiso Mithi08/07/2025, 17:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
The persistent discrepancies between early and late universe cosmological measurements of the Hubble parameter ($H_0$) and the matter clustering parameter ($S_8$) pose significant challenges to current physics. In this study, we take into account such discrepancies to solve through the modified theory of gravity known as $f(Q)$ gravity (a symmetric teleparallel) framework where gravity is...
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Tshegofatso Tshipi09/07/2025, 09:20Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Traditional numerical methods have been widely used to determine eigenvalues in quantum few-body problems. But little effort has gone towards exploring novel approaches like Physics-Informed Neural Networks (PINNs) as an alternative. In this work we shall explore the application of PINNs to determine the low-lying bound state for a toy molecular potential and the Woods-Saxon potential. The...
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Anele Ncube (University of Johannesburg)09/07/2025, 09:40Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Laplacian eigenmodes in non-trivial topologies (e.g. having twisted periodicity) are important in constructing a complete picture of the physics at play within models that incorporate compact extradimensional spaces. Determining them analytically is generally unwieldy, and the existing standard numerical methods have limited ability as spatial dimensions increase and when computing...
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Mr Taheer Jooma Abbajee (Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa)09/07/2025, 10:00Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Time series prediction is the process of forecasting future values of a system by analysing historical data to identify patterns, trends and variations. There are two main approaches to time series prediction: model-based and data-driven. Chaotic dynamical systems are often difficult to predict due to sensitive dependence on initial conditions leading to possible long-term divergence in...
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Hannah van der Schyf (University of Witwatersrand)09/07/2025, 10:50Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
A wide array of jet substructure based techniques have been used to discriminate large-radius jets coming from the hadronic decay of top quarks against those from light quark or gluons. However, discriminating jets with more than three-prongs have been much less explored. In this work, a new physics signal of a boosted right handed heavy neutrino decaying to a top-bottom quark along with a...
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Ofentse Matlhakola (University of the Witwatersrand)09/07/2025, 11:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
In high-energy particle collisions, high-momentum quarks and gluons (collectively called partons) are emitted from the colliding particles. As these partons move away from the collision point, they transfer their energy to multiple lower energy particles in a cascading process known as a parton shower. Eventually, the low-energy partons combine to form hadrons, which are collected into a jet....
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Nia O'Callaghan (University of Cape Town)09/07/2025, 11:50Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
With the ultimate goal of analysing probe quarks in a Quark-Gluon Plasma via the AdS/CFT correspon-
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dance, we explore here the motion of fundamental strings in a curved target spacetime. Specifically, our goal will
be a target space of AdS5 โSchwarzschild, which under the correspondance is dual to a conformal field theory
approximating Quantum Chromodynamics. We will model both the case of... -
Ben Bert (University of Cape Town)09/07/2025, 12:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions create a nuclear fireball that serves as a powerful laboratory for probing the frontiers of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD). In recent years, there has been growing interest in the study of small collision systemsโsuch as proton-proton ($pp$) and proton-nucleus ($pA$) interactionsโat facilities like RHIC and the LHC. Many of the assumptions underlying the...
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Mr Ayanda Zungu (Centre for Space Research, North-West University, Mahikeng 2745, South Africa)10/07/2025, 09:20Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Recently, Bauer et al. [1,2] introduced open quantum Brownian motion (OQBM) as a scaling limit of discrete-time open quantum walks [3,4], providing a new mathematical framework for quantum Brownian motion. In this setting, the dynamics of the Brownian particle are governed by dissipative interactions with a thermal bath and depend on the state of internal degrees of freedom. A microscopic...
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Rens Roosenstein (University of Cape Town, University of Amsterdam)10/07/2025, 09:40Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Understanding the behavior of matter under extreme conditions is one of the key goals of high-energy physics. In particular, the study of the quark-gluon plasma (QGP) offers insights into the early universe and the dynamics of strongly interacting matter. A powerful way to study such systems in thermal equilibrium is through the thermal partition function, which encodes the statistical...
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Deepak Kar (University of Witwatersrand)10/07/2025, 10:50Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Strongly interacting dark sectors, colloquially referred to as dark-QCD, is becoming increasingly popular in the collider community, primarily because of the rich phenomenology and the novel signatures it offers. The author pioneered the first search for semi-visible jets in ATLAS, and is following that up with multiple studies focussing on other final states (arXiv:2207.01885), new generator...
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Jarryd Bath (University of Pretoria)10/07/2025, 11:10Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
Integrability of gauge theories in the planar limit is a very powerful property which allows for a complete determination of the spectrum of the theory, but so far it has mostly been relevant for the most supersymmetric theory, $\mathcal{N}=4$ super Yang-Mills and we would like to extend this to a much larger class of theories. In this talk, I will focus on $\mathcal{N}=2$ superconformal...
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Jarryd Bath (University of Pretoria)10/07/2025, 11:30Track G - Theoretical and Computational PhysicsOral Presentation
In this talk, I will discuss a computation of the Schur Index of $\mathcal{N}=4$ super Yang-Mills theory with $\mathrm{SU}(3)$ gauge group. The Schur index counts the number of 1/8 BPS states of a theory. In order to find the gauge invariant (physical) states one must compute several nested complex contour integrals. Through Cauchโs theorem, this reduces to finding the residues of the...
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Magdeline Seabi (Nelson Mandela University)