South-Eastern Particle Theory Alliance Sussex - RHUL - UCL 2017-2020 - Sussex node
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Sussex
Department Name: Sch of Mathematical & Physical Sciences
Abstract
The proposed research joins scientists of the particle theory groups at Sussex, Royal Holloway and University College London in the hunt for new physics under three broad headings:
Collider and low-energy phenomenology:
The Large Hadron Collider boosts elementary particles to velocities so close to that of light that their effective mass grows by a factor of a billion. By smashing these particles together there are new discoveries to be made, and new theories of physics to test. We will work on the complex task of relating the debris of these collisions to the new models put forward by theorists to explain some of the most puzzling questions of the universe - what is the origin of mass? and is there a quantum theory of gravity?
Particle astrophysics and cosmology:
One of the most active areas of research in the past decade has been at the interface between particle physics and
cosmology. In order to understand the history of the universe we must understand physical laws in the first moments of the Big Bang, when temperatures and particle energies were huge. Conversely, by detailed observations of the universe today we can trace back the conditions and make deductions about physical laws at high energies.
Our research will tackle big questions about the universe: why is there more matter than antimatter? what is the nature of neutrinos and dark matter? is there any evidence out there for strings or other cosmic defects? and can we understand the history of the universe from the epoch of inflation until the present day in one overarching theory?
Fixed points of quantum field theory:
The recent discovery that Standard Model-like theories can be fundamental and predictive up to highest energies without being asymptotically free has opened a door into uncharted territory. These novel theories offer alternative ways to UV complete the Standard Model and to address its open challenges from an entirely new angle. Our research will focus on the systematic evaluation of these new types of theories, including the construction of benchmark models beyond the Standard Model. We combine these studies with our continuing quest towards a quantum version of general relativity. Predictions of these scenarios will be contrasted with data from particle colliders and cosmology.
Collider and low-energy phenomenology:
The Large Hadron Collider boosts elementary particles to velocities so close to that of light that their effective mass grows by a factor of a billion. By smashing these particles together there are new discoveries to be made, and new theories of physics to test. We will work on the complex task of relating the debris of these collisions to the new models put forward by theorists to explain some of the most puzzling questions of the universe - what is the origin of mass? and is there a quantum theory of gravity?
Particle astrophysics and cosmology:
One of the most active areas of research in the past decade has been at the interface between particle physics and
cosmology. In order to understand the history of the universe we must understand physical laws in the first moments of the Big Bang, when temperatures and particle energies were huge. Conversely, by detailed observations of the universe today we can trace back the conditions and make deductions about physical laws at high energies.
Our research will tackle big questions about the universe: why is there more matter than antimatter? what is the nature of neutrinos and dark matter? is there any evidence out there for strings or other cosmic defects? and can we understand the history of the universe from the epoch of inflation until the present day in one overarching theory?
Fixed points of quantum field theory:
The recent discovery that Standard Model-like theories can be fundamental and predictive up to highest energies without being asymptotically free has opened a door into uncharted territory. These novel theories offer alternative ways to UV complete the Standard Model and to address its open challenges from an entirely new angle. Our research will focus on the systematic evaluation of these new types of theories, including the construction of benchmark models beyond the Standard Model. We combine these studies with our continuing quest towards a quantum version of general relativity. Predictions of these scenarios will be contrasted with data from particle colliders and cosmology.
Planned Impact
The main beneficiaries of the research of our consortium outside academia will be business and industry, the education sector, school students, and the general public. The benefits will be delivered by outreach activities, by the training of highly skilled PhD students and post-docs, and by the exploration of opportunities for industrial engagement arising from the development of software tools for theoretical particle physics.
For schools and colleges we will develop activities and tools enriching students' understanding of the framework underpinning the Standard Model of particle physics. We will deliver them as part of our universities' physics outreach programme. We will also deliver talks on the research in this proposal both on and off campus.
For the general public we will disseminate our research through social media and public science events such as Nerd Nite. We will also seek to influence future decision makers amongst Arts and Humanities undergraduates through the Sussex module From Quarks to the Cosmos.
Business and the education sector will benefit from the rigorous scientific training we provide to the young researchers working with us on the research programme.
We will help students and postdocs wanting to make the transition out of academia with careers resources at department, university, and regional level.
We will also seek industrial partners for spin-offs from software we are developing, using our universities' structures supporting knowledge exchange.
For schools and colleges we will develop activities and tools enriching students' understanding of the framework underpinning the Standard Model of particle physics. We will deliver them as part of our universities' physics outreach programme. We will also deliver talks on the research in this proposal both on and off campus.
For the general public we will disseminate our research through social media and public science events such as Nerd Nite. We will also seek to influence future decision makers amongst Arts and Humanities undergraduates through the Sussex module From Quarks to the Cosmos.
Business and the education sector will benefit from the rigorous scientific training we provide to the young researchers working with us on the research programme.
We will help students and postdocs wanting to make the transition out of academia with careers resources at department, university, and regional level.
We will also seek industrial partners for spin-offs from software we are developing, using our universities' structures supporting knowledge exchange.
Publications
Aggarwal N
(2021)
Challenges and opportunities of gravitational-wave searches at MHz to GHz frequencies
in Living Reviews in Relativity
Ajmi M
(2022)
Thermal suppression of bubble nucleation at first-order phase transitions in the early Universe
in Physical Review D
Alexeyev S
(2017)
Gravity Induced Non-Local Effects in the Standard Model
Alexeyev S
(2018)
Gravity induced non-local effects in the standard model
in Physics Letters B
Alioli S
(2021)
Four-lepton production in gluon fusion at NLO matched to parton showers
in The European Physical Journal C
Ares F
(2022)
Effective actions and bubble nucleation from holography
in Physical Review D
Ares F
(2021)
Gravitational waves from a holographic phase transition
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Ares FR
(2022)
Gravitational Waves at Strong Coupling from an Effective Action.
in Physical review letters
Arpino L
(2020)
Near-to-planar three-jet events at NNLL accuracy
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Arpino L
(2019)
Near-to-planar three-jet events at NNLL accuracy
Studentship Projects
Project Reference | Relationship | Related To | Start | End | Student Name |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
ST/P000819/1 | 30/09/2017 | 30/03/2021 | |||
1957518 | Studentship | ST/P000819/1 | 30/09/2017 | 29/03/2021 | Alexander Lind |
Title | Gravitational waves from a cosmological vacuum phase transition - scalar field value |
Description | Movie based on Figure 2 of the paper Gravitational waves from vacuum first-order phase transitions: from the envelope to the lattice [arXiv:1802.05712]. This movie originally appeared as Supplemental Material associated with the paper. Caption based on original figure caption: Slices through a simultaneous nucleation simulation with parameters \(R_\mathrm{c} M = 7.15\), \(N_\mathrm{b} = 64\) and \(R_* M = 56.32\) showing the expansion, collision, and oscillatory phase of the scalar field. The scalar field value is shown in blue, and the gravitational wave energy density is shown in red. Note that the range of the colourbar for the gravitational wave energy density changes with time. During the oscillatory phase the gravitational wave energy density becomes very uniform and the "hotspots" are deviations on the sub percent level. The movie is also available on Vimeo, here. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2018 |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/5036789 |
Description | Non-academic impact related to this research is in the first place via outreach and public engagement. The members of the team have give talks to school children and the general public. |
First Year Of Impact | 2021 |
Sector | Other |
Impact Types | Societal |
Description | Characterising gravitational waves from phase transitions in the early universe |
Amount | € 506,689 (EUR) |
Funding ID | 333609 |
Organisation | Academy of Finland |
Sector | Public |
Country | Finland |
Start | 08/2020 |
End | 08/2024 |
Description | Quantum Enhanced Superfluid Technology for Dark Matter and Cosmology |
Amount | £424,512 (GBP) |
Funding ID | ST/T00682X/1 |
Organisation | Science and Technologies Facilities Council (STFC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 12/2020 |
End | 09/2025 |
Description | Helsinki Visiting Professorship |
Organisation | CSC – IT Centre for Science |
Country | Finland |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Collaboration on theory papers, co-supervision of student research. |
Collaborator Contribution | Collaboration on theory papers HPC resources 20% salary, travel expenses |
Impact | DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.251601 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2016/10/042 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2016/04/001 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.92.123009 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.98.103533 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.97.123513 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.96.103520 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.95.063520 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.251601 |
Start Year | 2012 |
Description | Helsinki Visiting Professorship |
Organisation | University of Helsinki |
Country | Finland |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Collaboration on theory papers, co-supervision of student research. |
Collaborator Contribution | Collaboration on theory papers HPC resources 20% salary, travel expenses |
Impact | DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.251601 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2016/10/042 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2016/04/001 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.92.123009 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.98.103533 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.97.123513 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.96.103520 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.95.063520 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.251601 |
Start Year | 2012 |
Description | Topological defects |
Organisation | University of Geneva |
Department | Department of Physics |
Country | Switzerland |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Research collaboration Hosting research visits |
Collaborator Contribution | Research collaboration Hosting research visits HPC resources |
Impact | https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2016/10/042 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.93.085014 https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/600/1/012025 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2018/04/014 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2017/07/026 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.96.023525 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2018/04/016 |
Start Year | 2010 |
Description | Topological defects |
Organisation | University of the Basque Country |
Department | Department of Theoretical Physics and History of Science |
Country | Spain |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Research collaboration Hosting research visits |
Collaborator Contribution | Research collaboration Hosting research visits HPC resources |
Impact | https://doi.org/10.1088/1475-7516/2016/10/042 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.93.085014 https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/600/1/012025 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2018/04/014 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2017/07/026 DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.96.023525 DOI: 10.1088/1475-7516/2018/04/016 |
Start Year | 2010 |
Description | phase transitions |
Organisation | Deutsches Electronen-Synchrotron (DESY) |
Country | Germany |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | collaboration with long term partner Thomas Konstandin |
Collaborator Contribution | joint research aiming at the understanding of cosmic phase transitions and related relics, such as gravitational waves |
Impact | There has been an number of research papers coming out of this collaboration |
Title | H1jet |
Description | H1jet is a fast code that computes the total cross section and differential distribution in the transverse momentum of a colour singlet. In its current version, H1jet implements only leading-order 2 ? 1 and 2 ? 2 processes, but could be extended to higher orders. H1jet is mainly designed for theorists and can be fruitfully used to assess deviations of selected new physics models from the Standard Model behaviour, as well as to quickly obtain distributions of relevance for Standard Model phenomenology. H1jet is written in Fortran 95 and Python 3, and takes about 1 second to run with default parameters. |
Type Of Technology | Software |
Year Produced | 2021 |
Open Source License? | Yes |
Impact | This program is very fast, and theorists can easily implement their models in it. |
URL | https://h1jet.hepforge.org/ |
Title | PTPlot: a tool for exploring the gravitational wave power spectrum from first-order phase transitions |
Description | PTPlot is a tool for exploring the gravitational wave power spectrum from first-order phase transitions, and evaluating the likelihood of detecting a signal with the LISA mission. The results plotted by this tool are based on the paper Detecting gravitational waves from cosmological phase transitions with LISA: an update, arXiv:1910.13125, which has been published in JCAP. Please cite both that paper, and this Zenodo deposit, if possible. The source for PTPlot is available at https://bitbucket.org/dweir/ptplot. |
Type Of Technology | Software |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Open Source License? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/6949106 |
Description | Lewes Sci-Screen talk |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Around 150 members of public attended a screening of Interstellar, at which I gave an introduction to general relativity and gravity. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
Description | Nerd Nite Brighton talk |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | 60 members of public attended Nerd Nite Brighton, at which I gave a 20-minute talk on gravitational waves from the early Universe. There was lively discussion afterwards. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://brighton.nerdnite.com/2017/10/10/nerd-nite-brighton-45-waves-vision-quantum/ |
Description | Postgraduate lectures on QCD resummation at NIKHEF, Amsterdam |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | I was asked to give a series of lectures for postgraduate students and staff on QCD jets and resummation, as can be described in the approach I have developed. I had the opportunity to describe the conceptual framework my current research is based upon, so that my work have a wider impact. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Public talk (Oman) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | 50 members of the Oman Astronomical Society attended my talk, sparking many questions afterwards. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
Description | Sussex Universe talk |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Schools |
Results and Impact | Around 60 undergraduates and school students attended my talk on gravitational waves from the early Universe. There were lots of questions. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://sussexuniverselectureseries.wordpress.com/ |
Description | Sussex University Community Day |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | About 70 people attended my talk on gravitational waves from the early Universe at the University of Sussex Community Day. There were lots of questions. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
Description | Talk at Planck 2018, Bonn |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | talk at an interantional confrence |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |