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Marking a major step in shaping the future of particle physics, the Physics Briefing Book for the 2026 update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics (ESPP) was released on 2 October. The document synthesises all the current input for the community-driven ESPP process and provides the foundation, alongside the final national input and an assessment of large accelerator projects by a dedicated working group, for the European Strategy Group (ESG) to formulate its recommendations in December.
The ESPP 2026 update, which was launched by the CERN Council in March 2024, called upon the particle physics community to develop a visionary and concrete plan that greatly advances knowledge in fundamental physics through the realisation of the next flagship project at CERN. A total of 266 written submissions, ranging from individual to national perspectives, were received. These formed the basis of rich discussions at an Open Symposium held in Venice from 23 to 27 June 2025, which brought together more than 600 physicists from almost 40 countries.
More than 600 physicists attended the Open Symposium in Venice from 23 to 27 June to debate the future of European particle physics. (Image: INFN)The Briefing Book, compiled by experts in the Physics Preparatory Group (PPG), distils these discussions and all the community input received so far into a single document that has been handed to the ESG. The document does not prescribe a single path forward but evaluates the scientific potential of different facilities and experiments. Following the recommendations of the ESPP 2020 update, it prioritises the need for an electron–positron collider dedicated to precision Higgs boson studies and, in the longer term, an energy-frontier collider.
Arranged in 12 chapters, the Briefing Book summarises the outstanding questions across the various physics areas, together with a discussion of the potential of the different proposed colliders and other experiments to address them. The differences in the physics potential between the various collider options, along with the technical readiness, risks, timescales and costs, will be reviewed to enable the ESG to produce its final recommendations. Crucially, the CERN Council requested that the community indicate not only the scientifically most attractive option, but also alternative options to be pursued if the chosen preferred plan turns out not to be feasible or competitive.
“We wish to deeply thank the co-conveners, scientific secretaries and all members of the PPG working groups for their hard work and dedication in summarising the main messages from the many strategy input submissions and the discussions at the Open Symposium in this book,” says Karl Jakobs, Strategy Secretary, University of Freiburg. “As we have seen from the input so far, the ESSP 2026 update has revealed a vibrant scientific landscape across high-energy physics and a community united in its desire for a future flagship collider at CERN.”
The next step towards updating the ESPP is the submission of the final national input, with a deadline of 14 November. The ESG project-assessment working group will release its findings on 17 October such that they can be taken into account. The final drafting session of the Strategy update will then take place from 1 to 5 December at Monte Verità Ascona, Switzerland, where the community recommendations will be finalised. These will be presented to the CERN Council in March 2026 and discussed at a dedicated meeting of the CERN Council in May 2026 in Budapest.
Further information:
European Strategy update: the community speaks
https://cerncourier.com/european-strategy-update-the-community-speaks/
Europe’s collider strategy takes shape
https://cerncourier.com/a/europes-collider-strategy-takes-shape/
On 1 October, a new branch of the CERN Community Support Centre (CCSC) opened on the ground floor of the Main Building (Building 60). As previously announced, this new branch is a natural extension of the existing CCSC in Building 33 and is designed to serve the CERN community who already have access to the site. It is home to the Service Desk and IT Support on Site (IT-SOS), both open Monday to Friday, from 8.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m., as well as UNIQA, open Monday to Friday 9.00 a.m. to 1.00 p.m., and Tuesdays and Thursdays 2.00 to 4.00 p.m.
In the same week, CERN Management have been returning to the new look Building 60 corridors, following an extensive renovation project that began in 2023.
CERN Management are returning to the Building 60 corridors, following an extensive renovation project that began in 2023. (Image: CERN)Don’t miss your chance to sign up for guided tours of major renovation or construction sites, including Building 60, on 13 October as part of the Campus Development Day, as highlighted by Raphaël Bello and Mar Capeáns in their recent article. Meet the engineers, architects and colleagues who designed, built and now use the buildings.
Book your visits now via cern.ch/campus-day.
katebrad Fri, 10/03/2025 - 10:56 Byline Internal Communication Publication Date Fri, 10/03/2025 - 12:07Over the past two weeks, despite many LHC fills ending due to the machine’s protection systems rather than by the LHC Engineer in Charge (LHC-EiC), the LHC has still performed very well, with an overall availability of around 75% and beams in collision for nearly 60% of the time. Thanks to this, the integrated luminosity passed the 90 fb⁻¹ mark on 28 September, nearing the forecast curve. As I write, the integrated luminosity is 92 fb⁻¹, only 2 fb⁻¹ short of the forecast 94 fb⁻¹, with five more days still available before the start of the third machine development (MD) block, which will last four days. After that block, just 24 days remain in the 2025 proton run. Reaching the target of 120 fb⁻¹ is therefore feasible, though it will remain a challenge. Fortunately, the issues with the non-conforming RF finger module and the collimator affected by a vacuum leak are not limiting operational performance.
The integrated luminosity prediction (green line) and the integrated luminosity achieved for ATLAS (blue dots) and CMS (black dots). The blue bands in June, September, October and November represent machine development blocks 1 to 4. The green and yellow bands in November and December represent a technical stop (green) and the lead-ion run (yellow). (Image: CERN)The injector chain is gearing up to deliver the necessary beams for the LHC lead-ion physics run, scheduled to begin on 15 November. The full chain for lead ions involves Linac3, LEIR, the PS and the SPS. Beyond the LHC, lead-ion beams are also used in the PS East Area and the SPS North Area.
The Linac3 source, which produced oxygen and neon ions in July, has now been converted to produce lead ions, and beams were successfully delivered to LEIR for the start of its commissioning on 15 September. Commissioning in LEIR, which is carried out only on working days, progressed smoothly, allowing lead ions to reach the PS a week ahead of the scheduled date of 6 October. The SPS is next in line, expecting its first lead-ion beams on 13 November, which will be used to commission two separate ion cycles: one for fixed-target physics in the SPS North Area and one for the LHC.
Beam commissioning in the PS can proceed fully in parallel with proton delivery to users. In the SPS, however, only part of the commissioning can run in parallel. Most requires dedicated time slots without proton delivery to the North Area. For this purpose, three dedicated 10-hour sessions are planned, on 15 and 29 October and 5 November. Lead ions are then scheduled to be sent to the LHC on 8 November, one week before the start of physics.
Meanwhile, the delivery of protons for fixed-target physics across the injector complex is running at full pace, with excellent availability from all machines, although a fraction lower than in 2024.
Overview of the beam availability per destination for 2024 and 2025.The PS Booster (PSB) has so far accelerated 1.6 × 10²⁰ protons, of which 9.97 × 10¹⁹ (62%) have been delivered to ISOLDE. So far, 30% of PSB protons have gone on to the PS, where the n_TOF facility is the largest user, having received 2.62 × 10¹⁹ protons, or 56% of all PS protons.
With ten weeks still to go until the end of the 2025 physics run, the total number of protons delivered will continue to rise, while the distribution between the different users is expected to remain similar. As for beam availability, the hope is not only to maintain the current levels but to improve them slightly, aiming to at least match last year’s excellent figures.
anschaef Fri, 10/03/2025 - 10:16 Byline Rende Steerenberg Publication Date Fri, 10/03/2025 - 15:27Medical imaging, radiotherapy, space dosimetry, material analysis. These are just a few of the many areas that have been impacted by advanced semiconductor chips developed in recent decades by the Medipix collaborations at CERN in conjunction with over 30 external research institutes.
Hybrid pixel detectors were originally developed in CERN’s microelectronics group in the early 1990s to make sense of the complex events foreseen at the future Large Hadron Collider. Medipix and its offshoot Timepix grew out of this effort and have become one of CERN’s most successful knowledge transfer cases, triggering a significant number of commercial activities in widely differing application areas.
A symposium held at CERN on 23 September to mark the 20th anniversary of the Medipix3 collaboration showed that Medipix and Timepix still have much in store.
“Since the launch of the first informal Medipix collaboration in the mid-1990s, our collaborations have grown and so have the capabilities of our chips. With the latest version, Medipix4, offering a higher count rate, a larger detection area and a larger dynamic range, our collaborators can access the most advanced high-resolution photon counting chip in the world,” said Medipix spokesperson Michael Campbell.
Chips comprising 2D arrays of silicon pixels are the basis of every smartphone camera, where electrical charge induced by the light incident on each pixel is first integrated and then read out. Medipix chips perform a similar feat at very high rates, but in this case by detecting the pulses induced by incoming charged particles one by one. This provides minimal image blurring, a requirement to track the complex debris emerging from high-energy particle collisions.
Initially focused on simply counting photons, the Medipix technology has advanced through several stages to bring higher energy resolution and improved count rates. Adding on-pixel timing information led to the birth of the Timepix chips, which triggered a range of new application areas while remaining core to current and planned particle physics experiments.
The first and most longstanding licensee within the Medipix collaboration is Malvern Panalytical, which has used Medipix2 and Medipix3 chips to create solutions for material analysis both within scientific research and for industrial process and quality control. Speaking about the firm’s 25 years of engagement with the collaboration, Malvern Panalytical’s Roelof de Vries said: “The most important lessons learned from our company, to turn a research development into a commercial product, is to be patient, constructive and supportive, and also willing to collaborate with the Medipix team to make improvements or to suggest improvements.”
A detector, including a Timepix chip, was installed in the International Space Station in 2022 (Image: NASA)One of the notable Medipix applications is the 3D colour X-ray scanner developed by MARS Bioimaging Ltd, which helps doctors give their patients more accurate diagnoses. This year, the scanner entered clinical trials at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York. Anthony Butler of MARS Bioimaging emphasised that these machines are created to take imaging technology out of the hospital and put it in the community. “So, we’re not just providing better images, we’re making our healthcare more accessible and more affordable for people.”
Other cutting-edge applications of Timepix showcased during the symposium included the monitoring of radiation levels during space travel, the charting of progress in radiotherapy treatment in cancer patients, and quantum imaging, to mention just a few.
Attendees also heard from the first teacher to use Timepix detectors in the classroom to show STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) students the levels of radiation in the world around them. The teacher in question, Becky Parker, sees Timepix devices in school replacing the Geiger counter as the mechanism by which students understand radiation: “We've looked at bananas, Brazil nuts, tea. We didn't realise how different soils and fertilisers affect the radiation level of tea, which you might not consider was a thing. I think if we can expose students to this cutting-edge technology, it’s far more effective for young people understanding radiation than using old technology.”
Medipix is also used for educational purposes, in schools and at science festivals (Image: Dima Maneuski)
Many of the symposium presentations were given not by members of the Medipix collaboration nor even by the commercial licensees, but rather by clients of the licensees. This shows that successful dissemination of technology from high-energy physics to other fields relies on developing enduring partnerships with commercial players, be they startups or more established companies.
Further information:
roryalex Thu, 10/02/2025 - 15:17 Publication Date Tue, 10/07/2025 - 16:16
CERN, home of the World Wide Web, provides a plethora of informative websites to the world. Besides the CERN central web services like CDS, EDMS, Indico and Zenodo, there are the central Drupal, SharePoint and WordPress services with more-or-less moderated content, and the DFS and OpenShift services hosting more than 10 000 different individual websites containing even more information about CERN, projects and plans, systems and services, technologies and implementation, conferences and meetings, work and proceedings, personal achievements and success stories, etc. While there are many beautiful jewels among those 10 000 websites, there are also plenty of eyesores. Totally empty websites. Broken ones giving error codes. Test sites. Sites stating just “Hello World!”. Abandoned websites. Orphaned ones. And many that have not seen any internet visit for a very long time. Still, they are part of and constitute the CERN web sphere…
It is not just that such abandoned or erroneous websites are not beautiful or useful or that they leave a negative impression of our Organization. They are also crawled and indexed by search engines and for training AI models (the new kid on the block). Some are mirrored and thus make it into the annals of the infinitely deep memory of the internet. Is this the image that CERN wants to convey? Or should we get a makeover? Some beautification?
Security-wise, abandoned, empty and broken websites pose a risk in and of themselves. Just as abandoned cars or houses with broken windows in certain neighbourhoods invite more destruction and incite crime – the so-called “broken windows theory” − broken websites invite attackers and script kiddies to poke deeper (read also our “Digital Broken Windows Theory” article on that). They are looking for vulnerabilities or searching for confidential data, either of which might surface due to the unmaintained nature of the website, overly verbose error messages, default landing pages disclosing internal information, an unprotected folder structure or involuntarily exposed hidden functions. Nothing beautiful here…
We can do better. Let’s show our more beautiful side. Put our best foot forward. Change into our glad rags. And smarten up our web presence. Just a bit. Not to an extreme. Just making sure that any website that is hosted at CERN and visible to the internet…
The Security Principles for Web Applications, established and approved by the CERN-wide Computer Security Board, are intended to provide more (technical) guidance. While adherence to the principles is already mandatory, the Computer Security Office is planning to step up their enforcement during 2026 with the intention of catching blunders and misconfigurations and improving the security posture of our web presence – to make it a bit more beautiful than before.
Thanks a lot for helping us with that!
Do you want to learn more about computer security incidents and issues at CERN? Follow our Monthly Report. For further information, questions or help, check our website or contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.
ehatters Thu, 10/02/2025 - 10:32 Byline Computer Security Office Publication Date Thu, 10/02/2025 - 10:24A small yet innovative experiment is taking place at CERN. Its goal is to test how the CERN-born optical timing signal – normally used in the Laboratory’s accelerators to synchronise devices with ultra-high precision – can best be sent through an optical fibre alongside a single-photon signal from a source of quantum-entangled photons. The results could pave the way for using this technique in quantum networks and quantum cryptography.
Research in quantum networks is growing rapidly worldwide. Future quantum networks could connect quantum computers and sensors, without losing any quantum information. They could also enable the secure exchange of information, opening up applications across many fields.
Unlike classical networks, where information is encoded in binary bits (0s and 1s), quantum networks rely on the unique properties of quantum bits, or “qubits”, such as superposition (where a qubit can exist in multiple states simultaneously) and entanglement (where the state of one qubit influences the state of another no matter how far apart they are). These properties allow quantum networks to perform tasks that are impossible or inefficient for classical networks. Quantum networks can even be used to test fundamental physics concepts such as Bell inequalities and the structure of spacetime.
At the CERN Quantum Technology Initiative (QTI), scientists have recently set up a specialised laboratory to test how the CERN-born White Rabbit optical timing signal can best be transmitted together with entangled photons through an optical fibre. While similar experiments have been done previously by other research teams worldwide, this is the first time this technology, originally developed to synchronise accelerator devices, is being tested locally at CERN for this purpose. “The White Rabbit timing technology is the natural candidate for application in quantum communication as it provides sub-nanosecond accuracy and picoseconds precision in synchronisation, making it suitable for large distributed systems and quantum networks,” says Annick Teepe, the scientist in charge of the CERN quantum network lab.
The same timing precision is required in quantum key distribution, a protocol that generates secure encryption keys for quantum cryptography. “High timing precision is critical for demonstrating the distribution of entangled photon pairs, which forms the basis of entanglement-based quantum key distribution,” explains Annick. “Unlike other existing time synchronisation technologies, White Rabbit is open source and based on standards.”
In the current experiment, the White Rabbit classical timing signal is combined with a quantum signal from a source of entangled photon pairs that was supplied in-kind to CERN by Qunnect. The set-up also uses a superconducting nanowire single-photon detector that was provided in-kind by Single Quantum.
“With our tests, we aim to contribute to the global effort around the synchronisation of quantum networks and to help establish White Rabbit as a standard technology for quantum communication, even in distributed and complex settings,” says Amanda Díez Fernández, coordinator of partnerships for QTI.
(Video: CERN)abelchio Tue, 09/30/2025 - 16:37 Byline Antonella Del Rosso Publication Date Thu, 10/02/2025 - 10:00
From 10 to 24 September, CERN, DESY (the German electron synchrotron facility) and University of Bonn welcomed the winners of the 2025 Beamline for Schools (BL4S) competition.
Beamline for Schools is an education and outreach project funded through the CERN & Society Foundation that started in 2014 in the context of CERN’s 60th anniversary. In this competition, multiple teams of high-school students propose an experiment to be performed on a beamline – an experience designed to inspire the scientists of tomorrow to continue their careers in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths). The winning teams have the opportunity to run their experiment like true physicists, immersed in a cutting-edge physics environment in one of the three laboratories.
This year, high-school students from Belgium, Türkiye, Canada, Mexico and the United States carried out their own experiments using accelerator beams. “Physical”, the team from Türkiye, and “the Spallateam”, from Belgium, came to CERN, while DESY hosted the “Dawson Technicolor” team from Canada and the “Pumas in Kollision” team from Mexico. The “team XTReme” from the USA was invited to the University of Bonn to use its electron accelerator ELSA (the electron stretcher facility).
Beamline for Schools winners and their supervisors in CERN's T10 experimental hall. (Image: CERN)The collaboration between CERN and DESY on Beamline for Schools started in 2019 and, for the first time this year, the University of Bonn also welcomed a team. The participation rate has been rising consistently since the competition was launched in 2014. This year, more than 3500 high-school students participated, and a record number of 508 teams from 72 countries submitted an experiment proposal.
Beamline for Schools students during Sponsor’s Day. (Image: CERN)roryalex Tue, 09/30/2025 - 12:00 Byline Bianca Moisa Publication Date Wed, 10/01/2025 - 11:59
Puzzled by punctuation? Baffled by bullet points? Confused by capitalisation? Do you struggle to tell your colons from your semi-colons? And have you ever wondered why “organise” is spelled with an “s” but “Organization” with a “z” at CERN? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, help is at hand.
Every year, on 30 September, the United Nations celebrates International Translation Day, paying tribute to language professionals and the work they do to help bring nations together and facilitate dialogue, understanding and international cooperation. So, what better time to showcase one of the CERN translation service’s top tools?
Enter the English and French style guides, designed to help everyone who needs to write clearly and effectively in either of CERN’s two working languages, and to ensure consistency in the official texts produced across the Organization. The guides have been refined and expanded over the years and contain a wealth of useful information relating to grammar and style, common pitfalls and CERN-specific terms and usage, as well as guidance on inclusive language and plain English. Whatever you’re writing or editing, be it a formal policy document, a press release, a departmental newsletter or simply a sensitive email to your boss, the style guides are here to answer those tricky language questions that you never dared to ask.
The English and French style guides can be found on the website of the Translation, Minutes and Council Support group (DG-TMC). They are updated regularly, so it is best to bookmark them for future reference rather than downloading them. Feedback from the CERN community, including suggestions for additions or improvements, is very welcome and should be sent to translation.minutes@cern.ch.
katebrad Fri, 09/26/2025 - 17:16 Byline Rosie Arscott Publication Date Tue, 09/30/2025 - 09:14About a billion pairs of particles collide every second within the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). With them, a petabyte of collision data floods the detectors and pours through highly selective filters, known as trigger systems. Less than 0.001% of the data survives the process and reaches the CERN Data Centre, to be copied onto long-term tape. This archive now represents the largest scientific data set ever assembled. Yet, there may be more science in it than we can extract today, which makes data preservation essential for future physicists.
The last supernova explosion observed in the Milky Way dates back to 9 October 1604. How much more could we learn if, alongside the notes made by German astronomer Johannes Kepler at the time, we could see what he saw with our own eyes? Our ability to extract information from laboratory data relies on current computational capabilities, analysis techniques and theoretical frameworks. New findings may lie waiting, buried in some database, and the potential for future discoveries hinges on preserving the results we gather today.
For data to stand the test of time, it must be archived, duplicated, safeguarded and translated into modern formats before we lose the expertise and technology to read and interpret it. As outlined in the recent “Best-practice recommendations for data preservation and open science in high-energy physics” issued by the International Committee for Future Accelerators (ICFA), preservation efforts require planning and clear policy guidelines, as well as a stable flow of resources and continued scientific supervision. The Data Preservation in High-Energy Physics (DPHEP) group, established in 2014 under the auspices of ICFA and with strong support from CERN, estimates that devoting less than 1% of a facility’s construction budget to data preservation could increase the scientific output by more than 10%.
In the latest issue of the CERN Courier, Cristinel Diaconu and Ulrich Schwickerath recall some of the most remarkable treasures unearthed from past experiments – such as the Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP), whose data remains relevant for future electron–positron colliders twenty-five years on, and HERA, which still informs studies of the strong interaction almost two decades after its shutdown.
Diaconu and Schwickerath advocate a joint commitment to international cooperation and open data as the way to maximise the benefits of fundamental research, in compliance with the FAIR principles of findability, accessibility, interoperability and reusability. With the High-Luminosity LHC upgrade on the horizon, data preservation will play an important role in making the most of its massive data stream.
Read the full article “Hidden treasures” in the latest edition of the CERN Courier.
roryalex Wed, 09/24/2025 - 15:29 Byline Davide De Biasio Publication Date Thu, 09/25/2025 - 12:00The LHCb collaboration has released the results of its latest analysis of the rare decay of the beauty meson B0 into a K* meson and a pair of muons (B0→K*μ+μ–). Based on data from the first and second runs of the LHC, the new analysis confirms a tension with predictions from the Standard Model that was observed in previous analyses. However, such predictions are highly complex and are a topic of debate within the theoretical physics community.
The B0→K*μ+μ– decay offers a promising, indirect way to search for new phenomena, as it is sensitive to contributions from undiscovered particles that may have masses beyond the reach of direct searches at the LHC. By comparing precise measurements of the decay’s properties with Standard Model predictions, possible signs of new fundamental particles or interactions could be revealed.
The best sensitivity to new particles comes from the study of the angular distributions of the decay products, namely a kaon and a pion from the K* decay and the two muons. The LHCb team had previously measured these angular observables first using proton–proton collision datasets from LHC Run 1 and then a larger dataset that also included LHC Run 2 data taken in 2016.
In all of these earlier analyses, one of the observables, called P5’, showed a significant deviation from the Standard Model. This result had a statistical significance below the ‘five-sigma' gold standard required to claim a discovery, but it was significant enough to warrant attention in future studies.
The latest LHCb analysis represents the most sophisticated study of the B0→K*μ+μ– decay properties to date, using proton–proton collision data collected by LHCb in 2011, 2012 and 2016–2018. This analysis confirms that the P5’ observable is in significant tension with theoretical predictions. The results are in good agreement with the previous LHCb measurements and also with a recent CMS measurement.
“The new measurements show the same pattern of tensions with the Standard Model that we have seen before,” says Mark Smith, who presented the details of the analysis at a recent LHC seminar. “Further clarifying the experimental picture with the LHC Run 3 dataset and improving theoretical calculations should help determine the origin of the observed patterns,” says Leon Carus, who presented the results at the latest LHC Committee Open Session.
Read more on the LHCb website.
abelchio Tue, 09/23/2025 - 15:50 Byline LHCb collaboration Publication Date Wed, 09/24/2025 - 11:00
This summer, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) took a breath of fresh air. Normally filled with beams of protons, the 27-km ring was reconfigured to enable its first oxygen–oxygen and neon–neon collisions. First results from the new data, recorded over a period of six days by the ALICE, ATLAS, CMS and LHCb experiments, were presented during the Initial Stages conference held in Taipei, Taiwan, on 7–12 September.
Smashing atomic nuclei into one another allows physicists to study the quark–gluon plasma (QGP), an extreme state of matter that mimics the conditions of the Universe during its first microseconds, before atoms formed. Until now, exploration of this hot and dense state of free particles at the LHC relied on collisions between heavy ions (like lead or xenon), which maximise the size of the plasma droplet created.
Collisions between lighter ions, such as oxygen, open a new window on the QGP to better understand its characteristics and evolution. Not only are they smaller than lead or xenon, allowing a better investigation of the minimum size of nuclei needed to create the QGP, but they are less regular in shape. A neon nucleus, for example, is predicted to be elongated like a bowling pin – a picture that has now been brought into sharper focus thanks to the new LHC results.
The experiments focused on measurements of subtle patterns in the angles and directions of the particles flying outward as the QGP droplet expands and cools, which are caused by small distortions in the original collision zone. Remarkably, these “flow” patterns can be described using the same fluid-dynamics calculations that are used to model everyday fluids, allowing researchers to probe both the properties of the QGP and the geometry of the colliding nuclei. Accurate model predictions enable a more precise exploration of flow in oxygen–oxygen and neon–neon collisions than in proton–proton and proton–lead collisions.
ALICE, which specialises in the study of the QGP, as well as the general-purpose experiments ATLAS and CMS, have measured sizeable elliptic and triangular flow in oxygen–oxygen and neon–neon collisions, and found that these depend strongly on whether the collisions are glancing or head-on. The level of agreement between theory and data is comparable to that obtained for collisions of heavier xenon and lead ions, despite the much smaller system size. This provides strong evidence that flow in oxygen–oxygen and neon–neon collisions is driven by nuclear geometry, supporting the bowling-pin structure of the neon nucleus and demonstrating that hydrodynamic flow emerges robustly across collision systems at the LHC.
Complementary results presented last week by the LHCb collaboration confirm the bowling-pin shape of the neon nucleus. The results are based on lead–argon and lead–neon collisions in a fixed-target configuration, using data recorded in 2024 with its SMOG apparatus. The LHCb collaboration has also started to analyse the oxygen–oxygen and neon–neon collision data.
“Taken together, these results bring fresh perspectives on nuclear structure and how matter emerged after the Big Bang,” says CERN Director for Research and Computing Joachim Mnich.
Further material
Animation showing side-by-side comparison of lead-lead and oxygen-oxygen collision
Animations showing the quark–gluon plasma formed in collisions between heavy ions
rodrigug Thu, 09/18/2025 - 11:23 Publication Date Thu, 09/18/2025 - 14:30CERN’s CLEAR facility investigates novel medical applications of electron beams and the resilience of electronics in space. A short walk away on the CERN site, MEDICIS is developing ways to produce a new generation of radioisotopes with potential applications in precision medicine and theragnostics. The five-year extensions to these unique and versatile platforms approved earlier this year by the CERN Council will enhance and expand the beneficial impact of CERN’s accelerator technology on society.
CLEAR, which is centred around a 20-m-long linear electron accelerator originally designed to develop future particle colliders, serves a wide range of experimental users from around the world. Among CLEAR’s most significant contributions are its studies of very high-energy electrons for deep-tissue cancer treatment – including pioneering studies on FLASH radiotherapy, an ultra-fast delivery method that greatly reduces damage to healthy tissue, in collaboration with Geneva University Hospital. Another prominent example is irradiation campaigns carried out in collaboration with the European Space Agency, which have provided vital data to ensure that satellites and astronomy missions can withstand the harsh conditions of space.
In operation since 2017, CLEAR is now confirmed to run until at least 2030. To accommodate the growing number of beam requests, a new beamline is being built featuring two additional test areas: one in vacuum and one in air. This expansion will both increase the variety of beam parameters CLEAR can provide to users and create more space for multiple experiments to be conducted simultaneously.
For the first two years of its extended five-year mandate, CLEAR will focus on its core strengths: deeper investigations of very high-energy electron beams for medical applications, further studies on the radiation hardness of electronics, accelerator R&D, and training – including hosting the winning teams from the 2026 CERN Beamline for Schools competition. The CLEAR facility thereafter has a broad range of possibilities, addressing research demand in medical, beam instrumentation, and dosimetry domains while serving as a testbed for tools and techniques to characterise beam properties in next-generation accelerator injectors.
“CLEAR is well positioned to remain a flexible, high-impact facility for beam-based R&D, not only advancing accelerator physics, but contributing meaningfully to applications in medicine and space,” says Mike Lamont, CERN Director for Accelerators and Technology. “MEDICIS, meanwhile, is helping to address the global shortfall in medical isotopes through close collaboration with the biomedical community. Together, these platforms show how CERN’s accelerator know-how can deliver tangible societal benefit.”
Operating within CERN’s ISOLDE Class A nuclear laboratory, MEDICIS uses proton beams from the Proton Synchrotron Booster and advanced mass-separation technologies to produce innovative medical radionuclides for biomedical research. MEDICIS is a collaborative project involving 19 partner institutions, including hospitals and laboratories across Europe and beyond, such as CHUV, Heidelberg University Hospital, KU Leuven and others.
Since it came online in 2018, MEDICIS has successfully produced Actinium-225 (pivotal for targeted alpha therapy), ultra-pure Samarium-153 (enabling more effective and cleaner cancer therapies), and Tm/Er-165 (for molecular imaging and therapy research), among other radionuclides. It also played a central role in launching the European Union medical radionuclide programme PRISMAP, and this year was granted approval by the CERN Council to supply mass-separated radionuclides for clinical trials in collaboration with Heidelberg University Hospital.
Clinical trial of Ac-225 radionuclide in treatment of metastatic prostate cancer. MEDICIS did not provide the radionuclides for this trial. (Image: Kratochwlill et al. Journal of nuclear medicine, 2016)With its mandate extended until 2030, MEDICIS aims to scale clinical-grade radionuclide production to facilitate the transition from research to experimental clinical applications, starting with Sm-153. It will continue to develop the next-generation theranostic radionuclides Ac-225, Sm-153, Ra-224 and Er-165 while exploring novel radionuclides for more targeted and less damaging therapies, as well as reinforcing its leadership role in the European radioisotope landscape with the proposal of PRISMAPplus.
cmenard Wed, 09/17/2025 - 17:11 Byline Amedeo Habsburg Publication Date Thu, 09/18/2025 - 09:35The Linac4, PS Booster and PS all achieved remarkable reliability last week, with beams delivered to users 99% of the time. At the SPS, beam availability was also very good until 12 September, when an electrical fault in one of the static VAR compensators (devices that stabilise the electrical supply) caused a major interruption. The fault triggered a 26-hour downtime of the SPS and required the reconfiguration of a spare static VAR compensator. Thanks to the rapid and coordinated efforts of experts from several groups, beam operation was successfully restored in the early afternoon of 13 September.
On the left, part of the static VAR compensator installation. On the right, one of the 18 kV cables with the insulation damaged by an electrical flash-over. (Image: CERN)The LHC switched to machine development (MD) mode on 1 September, running a demanding programme of studies until 5 September. Some of these studies involved testing HL-LHC-like beams, with bunch intensities similar to those planned for the high-luminosity upgrade but with a lower number of bunches. Although the overall beam intensity remained below operational limits, the tests produced some vacuum pressure rises in the non-compliant RF finger module. As a precaution, the MD team postponed further high-bunch-intensity beam tests. The non-compliant RF finger module will be replaced during the next year-end technical stop. Encouragingly, X-ray inspections carried out after the MD block confirmed no further degradation of the RF finger module, which is reassuring for the safe continuation of beam operation and luminosity production.
The return to luminosity production was delayed by another challenge: a vacuum leak in one of the LHC secondary collimators at Point 7. Collimators play a crucial role in cleaning the beam halo and protecting the machine but, because they absorb high-energy particles, they become radioactive over time. Radiation protection experts carefully determined the cooldown time required before repair work could take place. Fortunately, the preceding days of running with lower-intensity MD beams had already reduced radiation levels, allowing the repair to begin sooner.
On Friday, 5 September, specialists entered the tunnel, opened and blocked the collimator jaws, securing free passage for the beam. Subsequently, the leaking bellow was sealed with varnish that usually holds well, provided the bellow is not moved (hence the blocking of the jaws). After successful vacuum pumping, the machine was tested to ensure safe operation without the affected collimator. Dedicated “loss maps” confirmed that other collimators and protection devices could take over its role, enabling safe operation to continue.
With these issues resolved and the staged intensity ramp-up completed, the first full luminosity production fill, with 2460 bunches per beam, was successfully injected and brought into collision on 9 September, marking a strong return to physics, a few days later than scheduled.
The integrated luminosity prediction (green line) and the integrated luminosity achieved for ATLAS (blue dots) and CMS (black dots). The coloured areas in the middle represent the first MD block (blue), a technical stop (green), the oxygen- and neon-ion runs (yellow) and the Van der Meer run (red). The blue band on the right represents the last MD block. As a result of the collimator issues, the dotted line resumes several days after the end of the MD block, putting us behind schedule and making it an ongoing challenge to catch up with the prediction. (Image: CERN)anschaef Wed, 09/17/2025 - 13:23 Byline Rende Steerenberg Publication Date Mon, 09/22/2025 - 08:19
At CERN, we’re pushing the boundaries of knowledge and learning every day. But it isn’t every day that you learn you should be more like a giraffe...
It turns out that giraffes have a connection to a new CERN training course on nonviolent communication (NVC), which starts this November. NVC helps people to share perspectives without judgment or blame, and it’s sometimes called “giraffe language”. The giraffe is used as a symbol of empathy and connection, as it has the largest heart of any land animal, while its long neck gives it perspective.
But this is just one of the hundreds of learning options on offer – whether it’s face-to-face learning in the newly renovated training centre, online courses (including an online coaching hub for leadership development) or access to e-learning platforms such as UDEMY for CERN or SecureFlag.
CERN’s Learning and Development team continuously develop their learning portfolio, working with subject-matter experts and responding to the emerging needs of the Organization. In addition, they organise Micro-Talks, with the next one – “Mastering digital wellbeing: Take control of your online life” – planned for 19 September. They also provide news each month via the Departmental Training Officers and regular updates on their Mattermost channel.
The recent Work Well Feel Well article highlighted the importance of committing to making meaningful changes, however small – and developing a new learning habit can be a great way to kickstart this. So let’s go back to school, take charge of our own learning and development and explore what’s on offer at the CERN Learning Hub.
ehatters Wed, 09/17/2025 - 11:46 Byline Kate Kahle Publication Date Thu, 09/18/2025 - 11:39On 10 September 2025, CERN and Fusion for Energy (F4E) signed a major framework collaboration agreement to advance scientific research and technological development in areas of common interest. F4E is the European Union organisation managing Europe’s contribution to ITER – the world’s largest scientific experiment on the path to fusion energy.
This new agreement was originally sparked by the shared interest of both CERN and F4E in high-temperature superconducting (HTS) magnet technologies and fusion energy. It opens the door to a wide range of collaborations, particularly in:
“Through this cooperation agreement, we will strengthen F4E’s capacity to deliver and, in parallel, address and answer complex questions in the fields of fusion energy and particle physics,” says Marc Lachaise, Director of F4E. “By working together, we will capitalise on the excellence, talent and expertise resulting from large-scale international projects managed respectively by the two organisations. This collaboration is vital for the advancement of fusion energy together with that of science. It is a fantastic step in the right direction.”
“In a complex and fast-changing world, delivering large-scale scientific infrastructure calls for shared vision, technical synergy and organisational resilience,” says Mike Lamont, CERN’s Director for Accelerators and Technology. “CERN and F4E face many of the same challenges – from advanced magnet technologies to sustainable project execution over decades. This agreement reinforces a partnership built on mutual interests and long-term commitment. It was a pleasure to welcome Marc Lachaise and the F4E team to CERN, and to advance a shared agenda for science and its impact on society.”
This framework collaboration agreement builds on and strengthens existing ties between CERN and F4E, which began in 2014 with a collaboration agreement on the impact of radiation on materials. That cooperation was further extended in April 2025 with a new agreement on radiofrequency (RF) power couplers.
CERN established a dedicated fusion technology coordination unit in 2023, bringing together experts in accelerators, magnet technology, and knowledge transfer. This unit reflects CERN’s growing commitment to interdisciplinary collaboration and its potential impact beyond particle physics. The new agreement with F4E is a prominent example of that approach in action.
anschaef Tue, 09/16/2025 - 12:11 Byline Anaïs Schaeffer Publication Date Tue, 09/16/2025 - 12:05Following our previous article, “Block ads, stay clean”, this time we look at a more elaborate scheme to compromise your computer: “ClickFixing” – luring you into executing a very simple string of copy/paste-like tasks to install malware on your computer*. Ready to be lured?
Patient zero of such attacks was a fake website called “github-scanner.com”, allegedly linked to the GitHub Security Team. While the genuine GitHub scanners are available directly on the GitHub site (and similar scanners are deployed within the CERN GitLab instance), “github-scanner” is entirely fake and has just one purpose: to get your clicks. To get your copy & paste. It starts with a CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) like the one on the left below but, unlike other CAPTCHAs, which usually ask you to identify cars, bikes or cross-walks on images, this CAPTCHA takes a different path. An evil path. A path not to be followed (see the image on the right; images from SANS).
Windows-philes will quickly see that instruction (1.) opens a dialog to run a command. A command which is hidden when you click Control+V in step (2.) and execute it with (3.) “Enter”. And with that “Enter” your Windows system has been successfully attacked. Compromised. Malwared. Gone.
Since then, fake CAPTCHA pages have become an increasingly popular way for attackers to take over (Windows) systems. Variations on that scheme have displayed fake browser update prompts like the one below (from keep aware):
So, what now? STOP – THINK – DON’T CLICK! is surely the best mantra ever. Running an ad blocker is surely another good practice. Check out our previous Bulletin article!
*This kind of attack is targeted at Windows operating systems (but variations might also work on Linux and macOS systems).
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Do you want to learn more about computer security incidents and issues at CERN? Follow our Monthly Report. For further information, questions or help, check our website or contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.
anschaef Tue, 09/16/2025 - 11:50 Byline Computer Security Office Publication Date Tue, 09/16/2025 - 11:43CERN’s new cultural season, Generation Higgs, is dedicated to youth as a driving force of curiosity, creativity and innovation. More specifically, the name is a poetic reference to students, doctoral candidates, young engineers and researchers, who inspire society through their endeavour to unlock the universe’s greatest mysteries.
Through cinema, music, theatre, science shows and public talks, this new season aims to bring science to life in engaging ways. Collaborations with Théâtre Am Stram Gram and Haute École de Musique de Genève (HEM) reflect CERN’s deepening dialogue with the cultural landscape of the region. Several initiatives also extend beyond theScience Gateway, bringing science closer to the public through extra-muros collaborations with Théâtre de Château Rouge in Annemasse and Théâtre Le Bordeau in Saint-Genis-Pouilly. This engagement complements a broader regional presence, with CERN being guest of honour at the 2025 Cité des Métiers – Switzerland’s premier career fair –and taking part in the Fête de la Science activities in the Pays de Gex and Haute-Savoie.
“Today’s young women and men are growing up in an environment where the discovery of the Higgs boson marked a major milestone in our understanding of the world that surrounds us. The Higgs, like young people, fuels the future ambitions of particle physics, as it is central to our reasearch,” says Dante Larini, CERN’s public events curator. “With this new season, we want to invite the young generations to truly own physics and science in general: to express it, question it and reshape how it is communicated.”
The cultural season will open on 25 September with a screening of Cédric Klapisch’s short film Les vrais chercheurs... (ne savent pas ce qu’ils cherchent). Along with co-director Jean-Luc Perréard, the renowned French director followed the construction of the Science Gateway for nearly three years, guided by architect Renzo Piano and a group of scientists from around the world, and found himself drawn into a quest where the search for the origins of the Universe merged with that for his own origins...
More than ten events will then follow, including the 14th edition of Partage ta science, which invites the public to discover the talent of local secondary school pupils, theatre play Collision(s), which offers an introspective, poetic journey revealing the resonances between scientific research and human experience, the international final of FameLab, the world’s longest-running and furthest-reaching science communication competition, and many more.
Media representatives are warmly invited to join us for the first event of the season, the screening of Cédric Klapisch and Jean-Luc Perréard’s short film Les vrais chercheurs... (ne savent pas ce qu’ils cherchent), which will take place on 25 September. Event in French, with CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti, film directors Cédric Klapisch and Jean-Luc Perréard, Science Gateway architect Renzo Piano and President of the Fondazione Agnelli John Elkann.
rodrigug Wed, 09/03/2025 - 15:18 Publication Date Mon, 09/08/2025 - 10:00Instrumentation to measure beam parameters is essential for delivering high-quality beams, not only in the LHC, but throughout the whole injector chain. In many cases, redundancy is built in so that measurements can continue even if one device fails. Recently, however, the Proton Synchrotron (PS) reached the point where a broken wire scanner had to be replaced to ensure continued monitoring of beam quality.
The wire scanner, pictured here on a table in the workshop, is a key instrument used to measure the size and shape of the beam in the horizontal and vertical planes by scanning a fine wire through the proton beam at high speed and recording the resulting secondary particle shower as a function of the position of the wire in the beam. Since the luminosity in the LHC is determined by the number of protons in the beam and the size of the beam when it goes into collision, measuring the beam size in the injectors is very important in order to maximise the number of collisions in the LHC experiments. (Image: CERN)On 20 August, attention also turned to Linac4, where the ion source required an intervention to replace a malfunctioning valve controlling the hydrogen gas inlet. Such work typically takes only a couple of hours, but is followed by 8 to 10 hours of source reconditioning before normal operation can resume. The timing offered a nice opportunity to carry out the PS wire-scanner replacement.
While this work was taking place in the injectors, the LHC aimed for uninterrupted collisions. At 8.05 a.m., the machine was fully filled, and by 8.37 a.m. beams were colliding. At that moment, the Linac4 source was taken offline to begin the gas-valve replacement. The wire-scanner exchange in the PS was also under way by 8.45 a.m. and, thanks to excellent preparation, was completed by 11.00 a.m., with vacuum pumping immediately following. Meanwhile, the Linac4 source team also finished the gas-valve exchange efficiently, allowing reconditioning to start.
By the early evening, beams were back in the injector chain. At around 6.20 p.m., a slightly lower-current beam (35 mA instead of 40 mA out of the source) was injected into the PS Booster, sufficient to re-establish all operational beams. Just five minutes later, the PS itself was receiving beam again. Not long after, the SPS also received beam. The injector complex was back in business…
Unfortunately, at 9.35 a.m., the beams in the LHC were dumped due to an issue with the quench-protection system in one of the magnet circuits. With no beam expected from the injectors before the evening, access was granted to carry out outstanding activities. By 12.30 a.m. on 21 August, beams were once again colliding in the LHC, and luminosity production resumed.
On 1 September at 8.00 a.m., the LHC beams were dumped, marking the transition from physics operation to the second machine development (MD) block of the year. For the experiments, this means a pause in luminosity production, but the dedicated MD period is essential for testing future operational scenarios and preparing the way for the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC).
The switch came at a moment when the LHC was performing strongly. In the weeks leading up to the MD block, the LHC managed to catch up impressively well with its luminosity forecast curve, thanks to very good machine availability and rapid turnaround times, i.e. the interval between dumping one fill and colliding the next. By the morning of 1 September, the LHC had delivered 70 fb⁻¹ of integrated luminosity to both ATLAS and CMS, just 3 fb⁻¹ shy of the forecast 73 fb⁻¹. This stands in sharp contrast to mid-July, when the LHC was behind on the target by about 6 fb⁻¹.
The integrated luminosity prediction (green line) and the integrated luminosity achieved for ATLAS (blue dots) and CMS (black dots). The coloured areas in the middle represent the first MD block (blue), a technical stop (green), the oxygen and neon ion runs (yellow) and the Van der Meer run (red). The blue band on the right represents this week’s MD studies. The slope of the luminosity production is on average steeper than forecast and had nearly reached the forecast line when operation was stopped for the MD studies. (Image: CERN)The MD programme that is due to end at 8.00 a.m. on 5 September is particularly interesting. Accelerator physicists are refining optics control at 6.8 TeV, exploring new ways to streamline the ramp-and-squeeze sequence, and testing improved cleaning strategies around the collimation regions. Other studies are pushing the boundaries of beam stability, probing novel collimation with bent crystals, and benchmarking how high-intensity beams interact with the machine environment. Several fills will also be dedicated to HL-LHC-like high-intensity bunch trains, assessing how they behave through injection, acceleration and collisions.
From 5 September, the LHC will return to luminosity production, beginning a new four-week period of proton collisions before the third four-day MD block starts in early October. This upcoming physics period offers the chance not only to maintain the excellent progress of recent weeks, but also to catch up fully, and possibly even surpass, the forecast luminosity curve, as we work steadily toward the 2025 target of 120 fb⁻¹.
anschaef Wed, 09/03/2025 - 11:49 Byline Rende Steerenberg Publication Date Wed, 09/03/2025 - 11:46The main ways to get your computer infected these days are clicking on the wrong link, accessing the wrong website and/or installing the wrong software. While we have addressed over and over again the best mantra ever (STOP – THINK – DON’T CLICK!) for browsing the web, addressing links in emails, URLs, text messages, WhatsApp messages or QR codes etc., while we have discussed the risks of downloading software from unsolicited websites, and while we try to protect your clicks as best we can, there is more you can do: run (the CERN) antimalware software and install advertisement-blocking software (“ad blockers” for short) in your browser.
(Credit: Malwarebytes)Ad blockers are fabulous tools not only to better protect your privacy but also to prevent your device downloading and displaying any suspicious or malicious website in the first place. Think, for example, about malicious scareware ads that look like antivirus alerts just popping up on your screen. Or ads that impersonate law enforcement, the local police or the national authorities and ask you to pay hefty fines. In particular, attackers try to abuse “Google ads” in order to sneak their malicious payload into your computer… Privacy-wise, ad blockers (try to) prevent advertisers from tracking your online activities, even as the attackers try to circumvent that blocking in a never-ending cat-and-mouse game. Actually, the number of trackers per newspaper page is staggering: 11 trackers blocked for Der Spiegel online, 4 for the New York Times, 10 for the Tribune de Genève and 5 for Le Monde… Now think about those numbers once you enter a less benign website?
If you value your privacy and, also important, if you value the security of your computer, consider installing an ad blocker. While there is a plethora of them out there, the Computer Security Office’s members use, e.g. uBlock origin (Firefox) or Origin Lite (Chrome), AdblockPlus, Ghostery and Privacy Badger of the US-based Electronic Frontier Foundation. They all come in free (as in “free beer”) versions for all major browsers and also offer more sophisticated features if you are willing to pay. Once enabled, and depending on your desired level of protection, they can provide another thorough layer of protection to your device – and subsequently to CERN.
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Do you want to learn more about computer security incidents and issues at CERN? Follow our Monthly Report. For further information, questions or help, check our website or contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.
anschaef Tue, 09/02/2025 - 10:19 Byline Computer Security Office Publication Date Wed, 09/03/2025 - 10:17Might two bent crystals pave the way to finding new physics? The Standard Model of particle physics describes our world at its smallest scales exceptionally well. However, it leaves some important questions unanswered, such as the imbalance between matter and antimatter, the existence of dark matter and other mysteries. One method to find “new physics” beyond the Standard Model is to measure the properties of different particles as precisely as possible and then compare measurement with theory. If the two don't agree, it might hint at new physics and let us slowly piece together a fuller picture of our Universe – like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
An example of particles that physicists wish to study more closely are “charm baryons” such as the “Lambda-c-plus” (Λc+) which is a heavier “cousin” of the proton, consisting of three quarks: one up, one down and one charm. These particles decay after less than a trillionth of a second (10-13 s), which makes any measurement of their properties a race against time. Some of their properties have not yet been measured to high precision, leaving room for new physics to hide. The particles’ magnetic and electric dipole moments are of particular interest. In the past, precise measurements of dipole moments in other particles have provided key tests of established theories and, sometimes, uncovered surprises that pointed to new physics.
A novel experimental concept aims to measure the properties of charm baryons using a fixed target and two bent crystals. Electric and magnetic dipole moments can be measured by forcing particles on a curved trajectory. Since charm baryons decay extremely quickly, however, conventional techniques using magnetic fields are not strong enough to obtain measurable results. An alternative approach could be to exploit the fact that the atoms inside a crystal are neatly organised as a three-dimensional lattice, forming tiny channels when viewed from certain directions. If a bent crystal is placed inside a stream of charged particles, the particles may follow these channels, experiencing deflections otherwise out of reach within such a short distance. Thus, this makes measurements on extremely short-lived particles possible.
In the full set-up, one bent silicon crystal is inserted close to the proton beam inside a stream of particles called the “secondary halo” – protons that strayed too far from the beam centre and would normally be absorbed by the LHC collimation system. This first crystal steers the particles away from the main LHC beam towards a tungsten target where the collisions produce charm baryons. A second silicon crystal then bends the path of the produced particles strongly enough that their dipole moments can be precisely measured with a specialised detector.
TWOCRYST was conceived as a proof-of-principle experiment, designed to test whether the concept really works in practice – from the performance of the crystals to the precision of their alignment. After only two years of preparation, TWOCRYST was installed in the LHC at the beginning of the year. “The experimental set-up is a simplified version of a full-fledged experiment, consisting of two bent silicon crystals, a target and two 2D detectors (a pixel tracker and a fibre tracker),” explains TWOCRYST study leader Pascal Hermes. “One goal is to verify if the particles can be deflected through both crystals in sequence – the so-called ‘double channelling’.”
Schematics of the TWOCRYST experimental set-up during the first measurements on 21 and 22 June 2025. The first crystal was placed at the edge of the main LHC beam at injection energy (450 GeV) and the target was omitted. Beam particles were deflected by the first crystal onto the surface of the second crystal, where some of them were deflected a second time (“double channelling”). On the right, the data recorded by the two detectors shows two distinct spots corresponding to single- and double-channelled particles. (Image: João Vítor dos Santos on behalf of the TWOCRYST collaboration)The first TWOCRYST measurements in June at an energy of 450 GeV showed promising results. All the newly installed hardware is functional and operational and, after both silicon crystals had been carefully aligned, “double-channelled” particles were observed for the first time at the LHC and at the highest energy ever achieved. The team will now complete a set of further tests at higher energies of several TeV. All the measurements will be analysed in detail to determine whether enough deflected charm baryons could be collected to justify a full-scale experiment. Whatever the outcome, TWOCRYST has already opened a new chapter of crystal applications at the LHC. The results from TWOCRYST may well shape the design of future fixed-target experiments and novel beam-control concepts at the LHC and beyond.
Members of the TWOCRYST collaboration at the CERN Control Centre after the first measurements (Photo: CERN) Insa Meinke Thu, 08/28/2025 - 14:42 Byline Insa Meinke Publication Date Fri, 08/29/2025 - 10:29
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