ATLAS Phase-I Upgrades

瑞士日内瓦欧洲核子研究中心的大型强子对撞机(LHC)是世界上正在运行的主要粒子对撞机设施。通过记录大型强子对撞机上的质子碰撞，ATLAS实验研究了实验室中有史以来最短距离和最大质量的自然。从本质上讲，它既是世界上最强大的显微镜，也是一种实验，它创造了只有在大爆炸时期才存在的自然界条件。那里的研究已经发现了一种新的基本粒子--希格斯玻色子。这一发现具有如此高的科学影响力，以至于2014年诺贝尔物理学奖被授予最早预测这种粒子存在的人。这一NSF奖使ATLAS实验设备得以升级，这些设备需要高精度地研究希格斯玻色子的性质，并对解释未解之谜所需的粒子进行广泛的搜索。其中一个谜题的例子是“占宇宙近30%的暗物质是什么”？还有许多其他类似的问题。未来三年是大型强子对撞机物理计划从8太电子伏特(TeV)的碰撞能量获取和操作，到扩展操作和数据获取能量的近两倍(13-14TeV)的过渡。来自美国的一千多名科学家参与了几个重大实验的科学计划。该奖项为纽约州立大学石溪分校的霍布斯博士和他在三所美国大学的合作者提供支持，以升级ATLAS探测器，使其能够在更高的能量下以更长的时间和更高的速度继续有效地运行。这次升级将使科学家能够收集数据，寻找新的物理学，解释随着能量增加而出现的粒子理论中的不一致，并充分理解希格斯玻色子如何适用于宇宙的基本理论。该奖项支持的大学将建造安装在ATLAS探测器上的新仪器，这是进行实时数据选择和收集并提供更好的粒子能量测量所必需的。除了产生促进基础科学知识的成果外，与这些升级相关的工作还培训学生、年轻研究人员和技术人员通过制定问题和程序来开展基础研究，以了解未知的东西，还培训他们开发和操作复杂的定制电子系统和先进的计算机算法，这些系统和算法需要维持极高的数据率，并将大型复杂数据集分类在几分之一秒内。

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva Switzerland is the world's premier particle collider facility in operation. By recording the collisions of protons at the LHC, the ATLAS experiment studies nature at the shortest distances and highest masses ever accessible in a laboratory. In essence, it is simultaneously the world's most powerful microscope and an experiment creating conditions that existed in nature only near the time of the Big Bang. Studies there have already led to discovery of a new fundamental particle, the Higgs Boson. This discovery is of such high scientific impact that the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics was given to the people who first predicted the existence of this particle.This NSF award enables upgrades of the ATLAS experimental apparatus needed for high precision studies of Higgs Boson properties and a wide variety of searches for particles needed to explain unresolved puzzles. An example of one such puzzle is "What is the dark matter which makes up nearly 30% of the universe"? There are many other similar questions. The next three years represent a transition of the LHC physics program from a collision energy of 8 Teraelectronvolts (TeV) data-taking and operation, to extended operations and data taking at nearly double the energy, 13-14 TeV. Over a thousand scientists from the United States are involved with this scientific program on several major experiments.This award provides support for Dr. Hobbs at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and his collaborators at three U.S. universities to upgrade the ATLAS detector so that it can continue to operate efficiently at higher energies for a longer time and at a higher rate. This upgrade will enable scientists to collect data to search for new physics to explain inconsistencies in the particle theory that arise as the energy is increased and to fully understand how the Higgs boson fits into a fundamental theory of the universe. The universities supported by this award will build new instrumentation to be installed in the ATLAS detector, which is necessary in order to carry out a real-time selection and collection of data and provide a better measurement of particle energies. In addition to producing results which advance fundamental scientific knowledge, the work associated with these upgrades trains students, young researchers and technicians to carry out basic research by formulating questions and procedures to understand what is not known, and it also trains them to develop and operate complex, custom electronics systems and advanced computer algorithms needed to sustain extremely high data rates and classify large, complex data sets in fractions of a second.