NSF-BSF: Elementary Particle Physics with ATLAS

该奖项将为纽约大学在欧洲核子研究中心（位于瑞士日内瓦的粒子物理实验室）的大型强子对撞机（LHC）上进行ATLAS实验的小组提供支持。大型强子对撞机和大型粒子探测器阿特拉斯（ATLAS）是利用美国国家科学基金会（NSF）和世界各地其他机构的资金建造的基础科学工具。他们的主要目标之一是找到希格斯玻色子，这是历史上成功的“标准模型”（SM）中的最后一个粒子，该模型在很大程度上解释了宇宙中形成物质的已知粒子的存在以及它们之间的作用力。这一努力取得了成功。实验的下一步是寻找超越标准模型（BSM）的物理证据，例如，这些证据可能解释构成宇宙大部分质量的神秘“暗物质”的存在。大型强子对撞机目前正处于第二阶段，能量几乎是之前探测的两倍，事件样本也显著增加。BSM物理学的证据可能会在更高的能量下出现，并从当前运行中获得更高的事件统计数据，并通过LHC和ATLAS的进一步升级来跟进。从分析角度来看，纽约大学的研究小组将研究希格斯衰变，通过几种方法寻找超对称和奇异物质新状态的证据，包括被称为矢量玻色子聚变的反应过程，并将开发重建和研究高能射流的新方法。纽约大学将通过美以两国科学基金会项目的支持，与魏茨曼科学研究所合作，寻找希格斯玻色子的衰变，通过重口味标签来吸引夸克对。在这里，纽约大学和魏茨曼的联合研究将利用先进的机器学习技术来识别和选择希格斯衰变中具有挑战性的最终状态。技术项目包括改进和改进ATLAS的缺失能量触发器，这是寻找新物理的关键变量，以及跟踪触发，这是处理高速率碰撞事件重建的基本技术，这在大型强子对撞机中很常见。该小组还帮助领导了一个名为milliQan的较小的实验项目，其目标是寻找可能在大型强子对撞机中产生的部分带电粒子。纽约大学小组的更广泛影响的努力是广泛的。对于普通观众来说，纽约大学关于大型强子对撞机的展览估计会吸引大量学龄儿童，而“希格斯猎人”项目吸引了来自各个年龄段的大量用户。对于中学教育工作者，纽约大学还计划举办讲习班，使教师熟悉和教育粒子物理领域使用的一些最先进的工具，为他们提供将新知识带入课堂的背景知识。此外，该小组的分析项目，包括统计应用，机器学习和分析保存工具和技术，可以扩展到物理以外的领域，该计划支持的年轻研究人员将接受这些创新和交叉技术的培训。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award will provide support for the NYU group working on the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, a particle physics laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland. The LHC machine and ATLAS, a large particle detector facility, were built as basic science tools using funds from NSF and other agencies around the world. One of their primary objectives was to find the Higgs Boson, the last particle in the historically successful "Standard Model" (SM) that accounts for so much of the existence of, and forces between, known particles forming the matter in the universe. This effort has been successful. The next step in the experiments is to look for evidence for physics Beyond the Standard Model (BSM) that might, for instance, account for the presence of the mysterious "Dark Matter" that makes up so much of the mass of the universe. The LHC is currently in the midst of Run 2, at almost twice the energy explored earlier and with significantly increased event samples. It is possible that evidence for BSM physics could emerge at this higher energy and with the higher event statistics from the current run and by means of further upgrades of the LHC and ATLAS to follow.Analytically, the NYU group will be studying Higgs decays, searching for evidence of supersymmetry and exotic new states of matter through several approaches, including the reaction process known as Vector Boson Fusion, and will be developing novel approaches to the reconstruction and study of high energy Jets. NYU will partner with the Weizmann Institute of Science through support from the US-Israel Binational Science Foundation program to search for the decays of Higgs boson decays to charm quark pairs, through heavy flavor tagging. Here the joint NYU-Weizmann effort will exploit advanced machine learning techniques to identify and select such challenging final states in Higgs decay. Technical projects include improvements and refinements of the ATLAS trigger for missing energy, a key variable in the searches for new physics, and track triggering, an essential technique for dealing with reconstruction of events in very high rate collisions, which are endemic at the LHC. The group also helps to lead a smaller experimental effort called milliQan, whose objective is to search for fractionally charged particles that might be produced at the LHC.The NYU group's broader impacts efforts are extensive. For general audiences, the NYU exhibit on the LHC is estimated to reach large numbers of school-age children, and the "Higgs Hunters" project has engaged users from a variety of age groups in significant numbers. For secondary school educators, workshops are also planned at NYU to familiarize and educate teachers with some of the state of the art tools used in the particle physics domain, to provide them with background to bring new knowledge to the classroom. Additionally, the analytical projects of the group, which include statistical applications, machine learning, and analysis preservation tools and techniques, can be extended to fields outside of physics, and young researchers supported under this program will have training in such innovative and cross-cutting techniques.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.