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
Hanson E
(2019)
Charged Higgs bosons in naturally aligned two-Higgs-doublet models at the LHC
in Physical Review D
Salvio A
(2015)
Classical and quantum initial conditions for Higgs inflation
in Physics Letters B
Battye R
(2014)
Classically isospinning Skyrmion solutions
in Physical Review D
Darvishi N
(2020)
Classifying accidental symmetries in multi-Higgs doublet models
in Physical Review D
Kim J
(2018)
Clockwork Higgs portal model for freeze-in dark matter
in Physical Review D
Pace F
(2021)
Comparison of different approaches to the quasi-static approximation in Horndeski models
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Biswas T
(2017)
Consistent higher derivative gravitational theories with stable de Sitter and anti-de Sitter backgrounds
in Physical Review D
Choudhury S
(2014)
Constraining $ \mathcal{N} $ = 1 supergravity inflationary framework with non-minimal Kähler operators
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Dev P
(2014)
Constraining non-thermal and thermal properties of Dark Matter
in Frontiers in Physics
Mazumdar A
(2016)
Constraints on variations in inflaton decay rate from modulated preheating
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Bhupal Dev P
(2015)
Corrigendum to "Flavour covariant transport equations: An application to resonant leptogenesis" [Nucl. Phys. B 886 (2014) 569]
in Nuclear Physics B
Donnachie A
(2015)
Corrigendum to "pp and p ¯ p total cross sections and elastic scattering" [Phys. Lett. B 727 (4-5) (2013) 500-505]
in Physics Letters B
Srinivasan S
(2021)
Cosmological gravity on all scales. Part II. Model independent modified gravity N-body simulations
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Chialva D
(2015)
Cosmological implications of quantum corrections and higher-derivative extension
in Modern Physics Letters A
Di Valentino E
(2021)
Cosmology intertwined III: f s 8 and S 8
in Astroparticle Physics
Ángeles-Martínez R
(2015)
Coulomb gluons and the ordering variable
Ángeles-Martínez R
(2015)
Coulomb gluons and the ordering variable
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Forshaw J
(2021)
Coulomb gluons will generally destroy coherence
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Carena M
(2016)
CP violation in heavy MSSM Higgs scenarios
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Hou T
(2018)
CT14 intrinsic charm parton distribution functions from CTEQ-TEA global analysis
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Hou T
(2017)
CTEQ-TEA parton distribution functions and HERA Run I and II combined data
in Physical Review D
Guzzi M
(2018)
CTEQ-TEA parton distribution functions with intrinsic charm
Guzzi M
(2018)
CTEQ-TEA parton distribution functions with intrinsic charm
in EPJ Web of Conferences
Guzzi M.
(2017)
CTEQ-TEA parton distributions functions with intrinsic charm
in Proceedings of Science
Van De Bruck C
(2020)
Dark D-brane cosmology: From background evolution to cosmological perturbations
in Physical Review D
Dimopoulos K
(2018)
Dark energy as a remnant of inflation and electroweak symmetry breaking
Dimopoulos K
(2019)
Dark energy as a remnant of inflation and electroweak symmetry breaking
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Van De Bruck C
(2019)
Dark energy, the swampland, and the equivalence principle
in Physical Review D
Baer H
(2015)
Dark matter production in the early Universe: Beyond the thermal WIMP paradigm
in Physics Reports
Trojanowski S
(2020)
Dark matter relic density from conformally or disformally coupled light scalars
in Physical Review D
Hollowood T
(2017)
Decoherence, discord, and the quantum master equation for cosmological perturbations
in Physical Review D
Conroy A
(2017)
Defocusing of null rays in infinite derivative gravity
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Bomark N
(2016)
Detection prospects of light NMSSM Higgs pseudoscalar via cascades of heavier scalars from vector boson fusion and Higgs-strahlung
in Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics
Chakrabortty J
(2015)
Di-photon resonance around 750 GeV: shedding light on the theory underneath
Guzzi M
(2016)
Differential cross sections for top pair production at the LHC
in Nuclear and Particle Physics Proceedings
Pilaftsis A
(2016)
Diphoton signatures from heavy axion decays at the CERN Large Hadron Collider
in Physical Review D
Ambrus V
(2014)
Dirac fermions on an anti-de Sitter background
Das A
(2014)
Direct bounds on electroweak scale pseudo-Dirac neutrinos from s = 8 TeV LHC data
in Physics Letters B
Dev P
(2016)
Disambiguating seesaw models using invariant mass variables at hadron colliders
in Journal of High Energy Physics
De Bruck C
(2015)
Disformal couplings and the dark sector of the universe
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
De Bruck C
(2016)
Disformally coupled inflation
in Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics
Van De Bruck C
(2015)
Disformally coupled inflation
Dasgupta M
(2021)
Dissecting the collinear structure of quark splitting at NNLL
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Akcay S
(2020)
Dissipation in extreme mass-ratio binaries with a spinning secondary
in Physical Review D
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 |