Responsive PDRA Support for the Experimental Study of Particle Interactions at High Energy

The Cambridge High Energy Physics Group focuses its research activities on experiments at high-energy accelerators, currently the Large Hadron Collider and the ATLAS and LHCb experiments at CERN, the neutrino experiment MicroBooNE, and the long-baseline neutrino experiment DUNE at Fermilab, and future collider facilities. The goal is to understand the fundamental particles of nature and their interactions, in particular, to discover physics beyond our current understanding, to understand why the Universe is made only of matter and not antimatter and to reveal the identity of dark matter.

The Group is also central to the multi-disciplinary Quantum Technologies for Fundamental Physics projects, AION and MAGIS, which use novel atom interferometry to detect and identify sources of dark matter and gravitational waves in the Universe. The MAGIS 100m and the AION 10m atom interferometers will start their exploitation during the period covered by this grant.

This grant will enable the group to fully support the optimisation and exploitation of physics associated to the ATLAS Level-1 trigger; to support the physics exploitation of MicroBooNE and other neutrino experiments; to exploit the first physics data from the MAGIS-100 experiment and AION-10 demonstrator atom interferometers; and to undertake blue skies detector research and development of the radiation hardness of silicon CMOS devices in preparation for and to establish leadership in experiments at future colliders. The opportunities offered by this exciting physics programme will not only drive the forefront of discovery, but also provide substantial impact to local enterprises and on public engagement.