Qweak will determine the weak charge of the proton, Q{sup p}{sub W}, via an asymmetry measurement of parity-violating elastic electron-proton scattering at low four momentum transfer to a precision of 4%. Q{sup p}{sub W} has a firm Standard Model prediction and is related to the weak mixing angle, sin{sup 2} {Theta}{sub W}, a well-defined Standard Model parameter. Qweak will probe a subset of new physics to the TeV mass scale and test the Standard Model. The details of how this measurement was performed and the analysis of the 25% elastic dataset will be presented in this thesis. Also, an analysis of an auxiliary measurement of the parity-violating asymmetry in the N -> {Delta} transition is presented. It is used as a systematic inelastic background correction in the elastic analysis and to extract information about the hadronic parity violation through the low energy constant, d{sub Delta}. The elastic asymmetry at Q{sup 2} = 0.0252 ± 0.0007 GeV{sup 2} was measured to be A{sub ep} = -265 ± 40 ± 22 ± 68 ppb (stat., sys., and blinding). Extrapolated to Q{sup 2} = 0, the value of the proton's weak charge was measured to be Q{sup p}{sub W} = 0.077 ± 0.019 …

The goal of this work is to characterize surfaces of intermetallics, including quasicrystals. In this work, surface characterization is primarily focused on composition and structure using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) performed under ultrahigh vacuum (UHV) conditions.