The Lancaster, Manchester, Sheffield Consortium for Fundamental Physics: Particle Physics, From the Universe to the LHC
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Manchester
Department Name: Physics and Astronomy
Abstract
Particle physics is all about understanding the elementary building blocks of nature and their interactions. Over the years, physicists have developed the Standard Model of particle physics, which is extremely successful in describing a very wide range of natural phenomena from things as basic as how light works and why atoms form through to the complicated workings inside stars and the synthesis of nuclei in the first few minutes after the Big Bang. However, we know that the Standard Model is not the whole story for it leaves many questions unanswered. Our proposal focuses on these unanswered questions and the way that scientists hope to address them in the coming years using experiments like the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) or observations like those that will be made using the Planck satellite.
The discovery at the LHC of a Higgs boson is a major milestone in our quest to understand the origin of mass. It is certainly not, however, the whole story. The LHC experiments are working hard to measure the properties of the particle they have discovered. They are also searching for new particles such as those predicted by supersymmetry. If supersymmetry is discovered then it offers the hope to explain the origin of the Dark Matter that makes up a large fraction of the material that is known to exist in the Universe. The scientists in our consortium will explore the theory of supersymmetry and dark matter. We will use data from experiments like the LHC to identify which of the many possible variants of supersymmetry are allowed by the data and to suggest new ways to explore those models in experiments. Any "new physics" produced at the LHC will be produced as a result of smashing two protons into each other, a very complicated environment, usually in association with "jets" of other particles. Members of our consortium will explore how we can make use of these jets to learn more about the associated new physics: the better we understand the environment in which new physics occurs, the more we are able to learn about the new physics itself. This is a complicated business that often necessitates computer simulations of particle collisions. Our members are experts in these simulations and have plans on how the make them more accurate, which is necessary if we are to make the most of the exciting data from the LHC.
The Standard Model of particle physics is also insufficient when it comes to explaining the early history of the Universe, when it was hot and dense. The evidence is now very strong that the history began with an era of accelerating expansion, called inflation. We are experts on inflation and its consequences. Inflation makes the Universe featureless, except for tiny quantum fluctuations that cause the density of matter and energy in the Universe to vary with position. These initially small variations grow to become observable effects. One effect is the formation of the billions of galaxies that populate the night sky. Another is to leave a tiny imprint on the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB), a faint hum of microwave radiation in which the Universe is bathed. The CMB is being studied in exquisite detail by the Planck satellite, which was launched in 2009. We are at the forefront of interpreting the Planck data in the hope of pinning down which of the various theories of the early universe are ruled out and which remain viable. The deficiencies of the Standard Model extend still further for it does not explain the amount nor even the existence of ordinary matter. Our scientists will use this to constrain possible physics beyond the Standard Model and to do that they need to master the dynamics of the Universe shortly after the end of inflation. Last but not least, we hope to understand better the mysterious "Dark Energy" that drives the current and future acceleration of the Universe: one possibility is that it is because Einstein's theory of gravity is not quite right and that is something we will explore.
The discovery at the LHC of a Higgs boson is a major milestone in our quest to understand the origin of mass. It is certainly not, however, the whole story. The LHC experiments are working hard to measure the properties of the particle they have discovered. They are also searching for new particles such as those predicted by supersymmetry. If supersymmetry is discovered then it offers the hope to explain the origin of the Dark Matter that makes up a large fraction of the material that is known to exist in the Universe. The scientists in our consortium will explore the theory of supersymmetry and dark matter. We will use data from experiments like the LHC to identify which of the many possible variants of supersymmetry are allowed by the data and to suggest new ways to explore those models in experiments. Any "new physics" produced at the LHC will be produced as a result of smashing two protons into each other, a very complicated environment, usually in association with "jets" of other particles. Members of our consortium will explore how we can make use of these jets to learn more about the associated new physics: the better we understand the environment in which new physics occurs, the more we are able to learn about the new physics itself. This is a complicated business that often necessitates computer simulations of particle collisions. Our members are experts in these simulations and have plans on how the make them more accurate, which is necessary if we are to make the most of the exciting data from the LHC.
The Standard Model of particle physics is also insufficient when it comes to explaining the early history of the Universe, when it was hot and dense. The evidence is now very strong that the history began with an era of accelerating expansion, called inflation. We are experts on inflation and its consequences. Inflation makes the Universe featureless, except for tiny quantum fluctuations that cause the density of matter and energy in the Universe to vary with position. These initially small variations grow to become observable effects. One effect is the formation of the billions of galaxies that populate the night sky. Another is to leave a tiny imprint on the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB), a faint hum of microwave radiation in which the Universe is bathed. The CMB is being studied in exquisite detail by the Planck satellite, which was launched in 2009. We are at the forefront of interpreting the Planck data in the hope of pinning down which of the various theories of the early universe are ruled out and which remain viable. The deficiencies of the Standard Model extend still further for it does not explain the amount nor even the existence of ordinary matter. Our scientists will use this to constrain possible physics beyond the Standard Model and to do that they need to master the dynamics of the Universe shortly after the end of inflation. Last but not least, we hope to understand better the mysterious "Dark Energy" that drives the current and future acceleration of the Universe: one possibility is that it is because Einstein's theory of gravity is not quite right and that is something we will explore.
Planned Impact
See the attached "Pathways to Impact" document for details.
This project has impact beyond the international scientific community mainly through the training of highly skilled graduate students and postdoctoral researchers and through extensive "outreach" activities of various kinds aimed at engaging directly with the general public, school children, teachers, policy makers and the media. Undergraduate teaching is also impacted beneficially by our research.
This project has impact beyond the international scientific community mainly through the training of highly skilled graduate students and postdoctoral researchers and through extensive "outreach" activities of various kinds aimed at engaging directly with the general public, school children, teachers, policy makers and the media. Undergraduate teaching is also impacted beneficially by our research.
Organisations
Publications
Di Valentino E
(2021)
Snowmass2021 - Letter of interest cosmology intertwined IV: The age of the universe and its curvature
in Astroparticle Physics
Dimopoulos K
(2017)
Initial conditions for inflation
in Astroparticle Physics
Di Valentino E
(2021)
Snowmass2021 - Letter of interest cosmology intertwined I: Perspectives for the next decade
in Astroparticle Physics
Dimopoulos K
(2018)
Loop inflection-point inflation
in Astroparticle Physics
Di Valentino E
(2021)
Snowmass2021 - Letter of interest cosmology intertwined II: The hubble constant tension
in Astroparticle Physics
Arnaud Q
(2018)
First results from the NEWS-G direct dark matter search experiment at the LSM
in Astroparticle Physics
Di Valentino E
(2021)
Cosmology intertwined III: f s 8 and S 8
in Astroparticle Physics
Dimopoulos K
(2016)
Active galaxies can make axionic dark energy
in Astroparticle Physics
Talaganis S
(2016)
High-energy scatterings in infinite-derivative field theory and ghost-free gravity
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Shipley J
(2016)
Binary black hole shadows, chaotic scattering and the Cantor set
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Dolan S
(2015)
Bound states of the Dirac equation on Kerr spacetime
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Ambru? V
(2017)
Thermal expectation values of fermions on anti-de Sitter space-time
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Talaganis S
(2015)
Towards understanding the ultraviolet behavior of quantum loops in infinite-derivative theories of gravity
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Ashoorioon A
(2014)
Black holes as beads on cosmic strings
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Balakumar V
(2020)
Hadamard renormalization for a charged scalar field
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Biswas T
(2014)
Super-inflation, non-singular bounce, and low multipoles
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Morley T
(2018)
Vacuum polarization on topological black holes
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Biswas T
(2014)
Generalized ghost-free quadratic curvature gravity
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Akcay S
(2017)
Spin-orbit precession for eccentric black hole binaries at first order in the mass ratio
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Nolan B
(2016)
On the stability of dyons and dyonic black holes in Einstein-Yang-Mills theory
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Morley T
(2020)
Quantum field theory on global anti-de Sitter space-time with Robin boundary conditions
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Conroy A
(2015)
Generalized quadratic curvature, non-local infrared modifications of gravity and Newtonian potentials
in Classical and Quantum Gravity
Bezrukov F
(2015)
Inflation, LHC and the Higgs boson
in Comptes Rendus. Physique
Albrecht J
(2019)
A Roadmap for HEP Software and Computing R&D for the 2020s
in Computing and Software for Big Science
Dulat S
(2016)
The structure of the proton: The CT14 QCD global analysis
in EPJ Web of Conferences
Guzzi M
(2018)
CTEQ-TEA parton distribution functions with intrinsic charm
in EPJ Web of Conferences
Dulat S
(2016)
Impact of the HERA I+II combined data on the CT14 QCD global analysis
in EPJ Web of Conferences
Dev P
(2014)
Constraining non-thermal and thermal properties of Dark Matter
in Frontiers in Physics
Van De Bruck C
(2019)
Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet Gravity with Extra Dimensions
in Galaxies
Abel P
(2016)
Vacuum for a massless quantum scalar field outside a collapsing shell in anti-de Sitter space-time
in General Relativity and Gravitation
Barausse E
(2020)
Prospects for fundamental physics with LISA
in General Relativity and Gravitation
Donnachie A
(2014)
Central soft production of hadrons in pp collisions
in International Journal of Modern Physics A
Balakumar V
(2020)
Hadamard parametrix of the Feynman Green's function of a five-dimensional charged scalar field
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
Van De Bruck C
(2017)
Reheating and preheating in the simplest extension of Starobinsky inflation
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
Leite L
(2016)
Absorption of massless scalar field by rotating black holes
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
Dempsey D
(2016)
Waves and null congruences in a draining bathtub
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
Dolan S
(2018)
Geometrical optics for scalar, electromagnetic and gravitational waves on curved spacetime
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
Ambrus V
(2018)
Analysis of scalar and fermion quantum field theory on anti-de Sitter spacetime
in International Journal of Modern Physics D
BĂ©langer G
(2015)
Limits on dark matter proton scattering from neutrino telescopes using micrOMEGAs
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
De Bruck C
(2015)
The variation of the fine-structure constant from disformal couplings
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
McDonald J
(2016)
Warm dark matter via ultra-violet freeze-in: reheating temperature and non-thermal distribution for fermionic Higgs portal dark matter
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
McDonald J
(2015)
Signatures of Planck corrections in a spiralling axion inflation model
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Dimopoulos K
(2019)
Primordial black holes from thermal inflation
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Bezrukov F
(2017)
Hiding an elephant: heavy sterile neutrino with large mixing angle does not contradict cosmology
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Lyth D
(2014)
BICEP2, the curvature perturbation and supersymmetry
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
McDonald J
(2014)
Negative running of the spectral index, hemispherical asymmetry and the consistency of Planck with large r
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Mifsud J
(2017)
Probing the imprints of generalized interacting dark energy on the growth of perturbations
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Lyth D
(2015)
Generating f NL at l ? 60
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
De Bruck C
(2016)
Disformally coupled inflation
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Dimopoulos K
(2016)
How thermal inflation can save minimal hybrid inflation in supergravity
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Description | Progress on many fronts towards a better understanding of the universe, by developing theoretical models constrained by data from the LHC and cosmology experiments such as Planck. |
Exploitation Route | By continued research. |
Sectors | Education |
Description | Researchers supported by this award have been very active in outreach activities for the general public, schools and scientists from other fields. |
First Year Of Impact | 2014 |
Sector | Education |
Impact Types | Cultural Societal |