CERN Accelerating science

A timeline of the EP newsletter

Since its establishment, CERN's Experimental Physics department (EP) produces cutting-edge research supporting the activities of the laboratory and serving the international particle physics community. Since its establishment, EP continuously provides resources and expertise in devising, designing and building new tools that will enable the particle physics community to further its quest to find nature's basic building blocks and to discover the simple physical laws that make our universe more understandable.

The diversity of activities covered under the umbrella of the EP department poses a challenge in establishing a common identity between members of the department and sharing the results of ongoing R&D activities across the department and with the collaboration of external partners and institutes. Closing this gap, was one of the main motivations for launching a website for the EP newsletter in 2013 with the support of Philippe Bloch, department head at that time and Kate Ross. As the EP newsletter enters a new phase with its new Drupal 8 website we have created a timeline with some of the highlights of the past years hoping that they will inspire you to share stories about your research and your suggestions for improving the impact of this publication.

New knowledge gained from the LHC experiments and other experiments across CERN’s physics programme included a closer understanding of the Higgs boson, stringent tests of the Standard Model of particle physics, seminal measurements of antimatter and fresh perspectives on the existence of new particles and forces.The large LHC datasets now available allow the collaborations to move into precision physics and gain sensitivity to extremely rare processes. EP department also supports a rigorous fixed-target programme opening avenues to search for new physics in ways that are complementary to high-energy colliders. Furthermore, the EP department is directly involved in the support of experiments at CERN’s unique Antiproton Decelerator (AD) focusing on high-precision measurements of the properties of antimatter and its behaviour compared to matter while also participating through the neutrino group to CERN’s Neutrino Platform and ongoing activities supporting European participation in accelerator-based neutrino projects in the US and Japan. Finally, the Phase 2 upgrade of the LHC experiments remains a top priority while the department is launching activities towards CERN’s next flagship project, the High-Luminosity LHC while also backing up long-term projects following the conclusion of the 2020 European Strategy for Particle Physics. 

As CERN is becoming the hub for a global community of scientists advancing the frontiers of knowledge, the EP department plays a key role in supporting a wide range of activities through its members' experience, unique infrastructure and tools while also providing training to the next generation of researchers. The selected stories covered the diversity of activities and helped establish a platform for presenting the ongoing technical and scientific efforts along with their impact both for high-energy physics experiments and beyond. Moreover, through special features and interviews we have tried to contribute to the effort of sending out the message on the value of fundamental research and scientific collaboration to different stakeholders including colleagues in other CERN's departments, the wider scientific community and policy makers. 

We would like to warmly thank the management of the EP department for the continuous support as well as all the contributors for sharing their research results through the pages of this publication. Last but not least, a big thanks to our readers and especially to those who shared their constructive feedback and criticism. As we are looking forward to the new era of the EP newsletter we invite you to browse through the special timeline by clicking HERE.