Birmingham Experimental Particle Physics Consolidated Grant 2022-25

伯明翰实验粒子物理综合补助金 2022-25

• 批准号: ST/W000652/1
• 负责人: Paul Newman
• 金额: $ 467.65万
• 依托单位: University of Birmingham
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ST%2FW000652%2F1
• 关键词: Birmingham; Experimental; Particle; Physics; Consolidated

Particle physics is a subject that captures the public imagination and can become headline news when major discoveries take place, such as that of the Higgs boson. With a large data set already collected at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the prospect of much more in the future, we are at a very exciting moment in the field. Birmingham has a balanced programme of running experiments, exploiting the full reach of the LHC in both energy and precision, as well as other aspects of the unique capabilities of the CERN accelerator complex. We study the particle collisions and decays observed in these experiments with the aim of determining the ultimate structure of matter and the forces of nature.We have held senior leadership positions in the ATLAS experiment over the years. ATLAS is designed to explore a wealth of particle physics topics at the highest energies ever reached in the laboratory. Of the billion collisions taking place in the experiment per second, only a tiny fraction can be recorded permanently for analysis. Our group built, maintains and operates a major part of the highly sophisticated on-detector electronics (trigger system) which has the task of selecting the most interesting events and reducing the data rate by a factor of 1000 within two millionths of a second after collisions. We are also very active in analysing the resulting data, with a strong team working on the detailed properties of the Higgs boson, the production and decays of the even more massive top quark and the subtle interactions between the carriers of the weak and electromagnetic forces (the W and Z bosons and the photon).Beyond ATLAS, the group is prominent in studying the decays of heavy quarks, which offer complementary sensitivity to new phenomena. The huge rates of beauty quark production in LHCb gives access to extremely rare decays, a Birmingham speciality being those of beauty baryons (combinations of three quarks similar to protons and neutrons). Our NA62 group studies particles containing strange quarks called kaons, including the ultra-rare kaon decay to a pion and two neutrinos, which happens only once in every 10 billion decays. Using the data taken so far, we have reported the most convincing observation of this decay so far, and will go on to study it further in future, exploiting its particular sensitivity to new physics.The LHC will remain the energy frontier facility in particle physics for a further two decades. An ambitious programme to upgrade both accelerator and detectors is underway. Every year after the upgrade (from 2027) will deliver the same number of collisions as ten years before, offering enormous new discovery potential, but also creating a very challenging experimental environment. For ATLAS, we are playing a major role in the construction of a much more radiation-hard and higher performance tracking detector and an upgraded trigger to handle the ten times larger data rate. Our LHCb and NA62 teams are also working on upgrades for future phases in the same era.The group has various fast-developing interests in non-collider areas of particle physics. These include the NEWS-G experiment, where we are developing novel spherical gas detectors to search for mysterious dark matter particles in a region of their mass that is not yet well explored. They also include preparations for DUNE, the largest-scale experiment ever to study the elusive neutrino particles; we are transferring our electronics expertise developed on ATLAS to contribute to DUNE data colection.We are active in preparations for next generation collider facilities, taking leadership roles in projects that plan to collide all combinations of electrons and protons and performing R&D into the detectors that will be required, including a growing interest in precision timing measurements. In another strand of our R&D, we are applying detectors developed in particle physics to new medical techniques such as hadron beam therapy.

粒子物理学是一门激发公众想象力的学科，当希格斯玻色子等重大发现发生时，它可能会成为头条新闻。凭借欧洲核子研究中心大型强子对撞机 (LHC) 已经收集的大量数据以及未来更多数据的前景，我们正处于该领域的一个非常激动人心的时刻。伯明翰拥有一个平衡的实验计划，充分利用大型强子对撞机在能量和精度方面的全部优势，以及欧洲核子研究中心加速器综合体独特功能的其他方面。我们研究在这些实验中观察到的粒子碰撞和衰变，目的是确定物质的最终结构和自然力。多年来，我们在 ATLAS 实验中担任高级领导职务。 ATLAS 旨在以实验室有史以来达到的最高能量探索丰富的粒子物理主题。在实验中每秒发生的数十亿次碰撞中，只有一小部分可以被永久记录以供分析。我们的团队构建、维护和操作了高度复杂的探测器电子设备（触发系统）的主要部分，该电子设备的任务是选择最有趣的事件，并在碰撞后的百万分之二秒内将数据速率降低 1000 倍。我们也非常积极地分析结果数据，拥有一支强大的团队致力于希格斯玻色子的详细特性、更大质量的顶夸克的产生和衰变以及弱力和电磁力载体之间的微妙相互作用（ W 和 Z 玻色子以及光子）。除了 ATLAS 之外，该小组在研究重夸克衰变方面也很突出，这为新现象提供了互补的敏感性。大型强子对撞机中高产夸克的速度使人们能够进行极其罕见的衰变，伯明翰的特色是美重子（类似于质子和中子的三个夸克的组合）。我们的 NA62 小组研究含有称为 kaons 的奇怪夸克的粒子，包括极其罕见的 kaon 衰变成一个介子和两个中微子，这种情况每 100 亿次衰变只发生一次。利用迄今为止获得的数据，我们报告了迄今为止对这种衰变最令人信服的观察，并将在未来进一步研究它，利用其对新物理学的特殊敏感性。大型强子对撞机将仍然是粒子物理学的能源前沿设施再过二十年。一项雄心勃勃的升级加速器和探测器的计划正在进行中。升级后的每年（从 2027 年开始）都会发生与十年前相同数量的碰撞，提供巨大的新发现潜力，但也创造了一个非常具有挑战性的实验环境。对于 ATLAS，我们在构建更加抗辐射和更高性能的跟踪探测器以及升级触发器以处理十倍以上的数据速率方面发挥着重要作用。我们的 LHCb 和 NA62 团队也在致力于同一时代未来阶段的升级。该团队在粒子物理的非对撞机领域有着各种快速发展的兴趣。其中包括 NEWS-G 实验，我们正在开发新型球形气体探测器，以在尚未充分探索的质量区域中寻找神秘的暗物质粒子。其中还包括 DUNE 的准备工作，这是有史以来研究难以捉摸的中微子粒子的最大规模实验；我们正在转移我们在 ATLAS 上开发的电子专业知识，为 DUNE 数据收集做出贡献。我们积极筹备下一代对撞机设施，在计划对撞所有电子和质子组合的项目中发挥领导作用，并对探测器进行研发，需要，包括对精确计时测量日益增长的兴趣。在我们研发的另一部分，我们正在将粒子物理学开发的探测器应用于强子束疗法等新的医疗技术。