Particle Physics with the ATLAS Detector at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider
Summary
This project provides the opportunity (both PhD and MPhil) to join the global effort to search for physics beyond the Standard Model of Particle Physics using data from the ATLAS Experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider.
Supervisor
Professor Kevin Varvell.
Research location
School of Physics
Program type
PHD
Synopsis
The ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN has now been collecting data since the start of 2010, with an enormous number of proton-proton collisions having been collected to date at collision energies of 7 TeV, 8 TeV, 13 TeV and 13.6 TeV. Whilst only a select fraction of these collisions are recorded for further study, the resulting data set is still huge. The search for the Higgs boson was successful, with its discovery announced in 2012. The focus has now become precision studies of the properties of the Higgs, precision studies of the Standard Model of Particle Physics (SM) at unprecedented energies, and searches for ”physics Beyond the Standard Model'' (BSM). The School of Physics has interests in several aspects of the ATLAS programme, notably:
- Studying the decays of neutral Higgs bosons, to better understand the properties of the Higgs. The new boson observed at the LHC, with a mass of around 125 GeV, could simply be the long-sought-after Standard Model Higgs boson or something more exotic. A lot of effort in ATLAS is now going into prising out its properties.
- Understanding the production of multiple top quarks at ATLAS. Measurement of mutli-top production forms a good test of the Standard Model as well as an important Standard-Model background to new physics processes. While in previous colliders the production of top-antitop pairs was a rare occurrence, this is not the case at the LHC. It is even now possible to see 4-top production at the LHC experiments. Top physics is interesting in its own right since, due to it being extremely heavy, the top quark does not form mesons before decaying, which allows the study of instrinsic quark properties such as the spin using the final state particles.
- Preparing for future upgrades of the ATLAS detector. The ATLAS detector is undergoing an upgrade to allow it to operate at the higher beam intensity environment which will be present when the LHC itself is upgraded to the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) at the end of the current running period.
Specific projects could be tailored to suit the particular interests of students.
Additional information
Consider the following for example:
- Potential research areas for PhD and MPhil topics
- Current PhD/Hons topics being undertaken at the location or with the supervisors
- Is the opportunity also available for Honours students?
- Techniques, methodologies, research approaches, technologies, etc., employed by the project - e.g., electron microscopy, textual analysis, etc.
- Scholarships/funding available
- Eligibility criteria (e.g., Hons 1) or previous experience or skills required
Some aspects of the above program can also be tailored towards shorter projects to be undertaken at Honours level.
Want to find out more?
Opportunity ID
The opportunity ID for this research opportunity is 1603
Other opportunities with
Professor Kevin Varvell
