The LHC experiment collaborations at the CERN win Breakthrough Prize - The Department of Physics of Ä¢¹½Ö±²¥ participates in experiments
The prize was awarded for detailed measurements of Higgs boson properties confirming the symmetry-breaking mechanism of mass generation, the discovery of new strongly interacting particles, the study of rare processes and matter-antimatter asymmetry, and the exploration of nature at the shortest distances and most extreme conditions at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider.
Supporting future scientists
The prize is divided among the LHC experiments such that the largest experiments – ATLAS and CMS – receive $1 million each, while ALICE and LHCb each receive $0.5 million.
- By mutual agreement of the collaborations, the prize money will be administered by CERN. The funds will be used for fellowships, enabling talented young researchers from the participating universities and research institutions to spend a two-year period at CERN, rejoices University Lecturer Sami Räsänen from Ä¢¹½Ö±²¥.
The Department of Physics at the Ä¢¹½Ö±²¥ is involved in the ALICE experiment, which specializes in the study of ultra relativistic heavy-ion collisions. In these collisions, nuclear matter is heated to over 2 trillion degrees, causing it to "melt" into a state known as quark-gluon plasma – the fifth state of matter. The more familiar states of matter are solid, liquid, gas, and (electromagnetic) plasma.
- In the early universe, less than ten microseconds after the Big Bang, similar extreme conditions prevailed. At that time, the universe had no nucleons – protons or neutrons – but instead, all strongly interacting matter existed in the form of quark-gluon plasma, explains Räsänen.
Studying the properties of quark–gluon plasma
The Department of Physics hosts the Finnish Centre of Excellence in Quark Matter, funded by the Research Council of Finland. It includes three theory groups and two experimental groups working in ALICE.
- The study of quark-gluon plasma properties is at the core of the Centre of Excellence's research. Our aim to understand how the properties of quarks and gluons become observable in high-energy particle impact experiments. Several members and alumni of the experimental groups participated in the work that led to this award, tells Räsänen.
