The science of stellar nucleosynthesis aims at understanding how the elements in the universe are formed in stars. On a microscopic scale, the formation of elements is dictated by the properties of atomic nuclei and their interactions. Of special importance for r-process nucleosynthesis is a fundamental understanding of shell evolution towards neutron-rich nuclei. I will briefly discuss the underlying physics of nuclear shell evolution and will report on our experiments at the University of Kentucky, CERN and RIKEN (Japan). I will also discuss our current efforts to develop a state-of-the-art silicon tracker device for the future ARIEL facility at TRIUMF (Canada) and will mention medical applications for improved dose monitoring in cancer therapy with heavy ions.

Precision electric dipole moment (EDM) measurements of fundamental particles are extremely sensitive to Beyond Standard Model sources of charge/parity violation required for generation of the observed matter/anti-matter asymmetry in the universe. I will give a brief overview of the relevant theory and the general experimental principles of such searches. I will then focus on an experiment to measure the neutron's electric dipole moment at Oak Ridge National Lab, and especially the optimization of the collection efficiency of the scintillation light used to measure the neutron's precession frequency.

The decay mode B-> K* ll is one of the most promising modes to probe physics beyond the standard model (SM),  since the angular distribution of the decay products enable measurement of several constraining observables. LHCb has recently measured these observables using $3\fb^{-1}$ of data as a binned function of $q^2$, the dilepton invariant mass squared. I will discuss that LHCb data implies a signal for new physics and provides unambiguous evidence for right-handed currents, which are absent in the SM. These conclusions are derived in the maximum $q^2$ limit and are free from hadronic corrections. Our approach differs from other approaches that probe new physics at low $q^2$ as it does not require estimates of hadronic parameters but relies instead on heavy quark symmetries that are reliable at the maximum $q^2$ kinematic endpoint.

A complete, fundamental understanding of the proton must include knowledge of the underlying

spin structure. The transversity distribution (h_1 (x)), which describes the transverse spin structure

of quarks inside of a transversely polarized proton, is only accessible through channels that couple

h_1 (x) to another chiral odd distribution, such as the Collins fragmentation function (∆D (z, j_T )).

Significant Collins asymmetries of charged pions have been observed in semi-inclusive deep inelastic

scattering (SIDIS) data. These SIDIS asymmetries combined with e^+ e^- process asymmetries from

Belle have allowed for the extraction of h_1 (x) and ∆D (z, j_T ). The current uncertainties on h_1 (x)

are large compared to the corresponding quark momentum and helicity distributions and reflect

the limited statistics and kinematic reach of the available data. In transversely polarized hadronic

collisions, Collins asymmetries may be isolated and extracted by measuring the spin dependent

azimuthal distributions of charged pions in jets. An exploratory STAR analysis with the 2006

s = 200 GeV dataset hinted at a charge dependent Collins asymmetry and motivated a dedicated

transversely polarized proton run in 2012 where an order of magnitude more data was collected (20 pb^{−1})

at an average polarization of 63%. This measurement, coupled with the same measurement

at √s=510 GeV and interference fragmentation function (IFF) measurements at √s = 200 and

500 GeV at midrapidity (|η| < 1) access higher momentum scales than the existing SIDIS data,

and will allow for a comprehensive study of evolution and factorization of the Collins channel.

Preliminary results from the √s = 200 and 500 GeV Collins and IFF analyses will be presented.

With the recent discovery of the Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Col-

lider, the mechanism through which fundamental particles acquire mass in

the Standard Model of particle physics is now complete. However, the vast

majority of the visible mass of the universe resides in protons and neutrons

which are not fundamental, but composite particles of the quarks and glu-

ons whose interactions are described by Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD).

These strong interactions are responsible for 99% of the proton and neutron

masses, and therefore these bound states of quarks and gluons provide an

ideal laboratory to study QCD and elucidate our understanding of visible

matter in the universe. To that end, one of the primary goals of the STAR

experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider is to use spin as a unique

probe to unravel the internal structure and the QCD dynamics of the nucleon

by studying high-energy polarized proton collisions. In this talk, I will dis-

cuss what we have learned about the origin of the proton's spin, emphasizing

recent developments in gluon and antiquark polarization.

The MuSun experiment will determine the μd capture rate (μ−+d → n+n+e) from the doublet hyperfine state d, of the muonic deuterium atom in the 1S ground state to a precision of 1.5%. Modern Effective Field Theories (EFT) predict that an accurate measurement of d would determine the two nucleon weak axial current. This will help in understanding weak nuclear interactions such as the stellar thermonuclear proton-proton fusion reactions, neutrino interactions and double beta decay. The experiment took place in the E3 beamline of Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) using a muon beam. Muons were stopped in a cryogenic time projection chamber (cryo-TPC) filled with D2 gas. This was surrounded by plastic scintillators and multiwire proportional chambers for detecting the decay electrons and an array of eight liquid scintillators for detecting neutrons. The goal of this dissertation is to measure the dμd quartet-to-doublet fusion ratio (q : d) and μd hyperfine rate (qd) using the fusion neutrons from μ− stops in D2 gas. The dμd molecules undergo muon catalyzed fusion (MCF) reactions from the doublet and the quartet state with rates d and q, yield 2.45 MeV monoenergetic fusion neutrons. Encoded in the time dependence of the fusion neutrons are the dμd formation rates d, q and qd. Consequently, the investigation of the fusion neutron time spectrum enables the determination of these kinetics parameters that are important in the extraction of d from the decay electron time spectrum. The final results of this work yield q : d = 82.05 ± 4.01 and qd = 39.67 ± 0.4 μs−1. 1