The skipper CCD instrument at the heart of scientist Javier Tiffenberg’s research shows promise for dark matter, neutrino detection and more. For the development of this forefront detector, Tiffenberg has won this year’s Universities Research Association Early Carer Award.

From the Department of Energy, Aug. 11, 2020: Fermilab scientist Chris Polly shares his love of physics, the importance of muons, a short history of scientists’ quest to measure how the muon wobbles in a magnetic field, and his journey to becoming leader of the Muon g-2 experiment.

Postdoctoral scientist Adi Ashkenazi of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has earned the Universities Research Association 2020 Tollestrup Award for her research into neutrinos, ghostly particles that can pass through solid matter at high speeds without slowing. Working with two different experiments, she and her collaborators hope to improve their simulations of neutrino interactions with atomic nuclei.

Three physicists share their experiences learning and communicating physics in a foreign language: English. Because of English’s hegemony in science and the world, aspiring scientists in non-English-speaking countries must learn English in school to pursue a career in science. In some cases, science classes are even taught entirely in English.

From Forbes, Aug. 10, 2020: The Department of Energy announced the development of a national quantum internet, with DOE national laboratories forming the backbone. The Chicago Quantum Exchange is a meeting place for collaboration and community creation for national laboratories Argonne and Fermilab, University of Chicago, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Northwestern University, and a number of large corporations.

From Argonne National Laboratory, Aug. 5, 2020: The U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Scientific Computing Research Leadership Computing Challenge has awarded 24 projects a total of 5.74 million node hours at the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility to pursue challenging, high-risk, high-payoff simulations. Fermilab scientists Andreas Kronfeld and Igor Rakhno are among those who have been awarded time on the facility’s Theta supercomputer.

From Photonics, July 27, 2020: The U.S. Department of Energy has unveiled a blueprint strategy for the development of a national quantum internet, reaffirming its commitment to widening the nation’s quantum capabilities by relying on its 17 national laboratories to serve as the backbone of the coming quantum internet and the secure transmission of information.

The MINOS+ and Daya Bay neutrino experiments combine results to produce most stringent test yet for the existence of sterile neutrinos.

Cornell University postdoc David Sweigart has won the 2020 URA Thesis Award for his dissertation analyzing the first year’s data from Fermilab’s Muon g-2 experiment. His efforts in analyzing the anomalous precession frequency of the muon could help confirm or challenge the Standard Model of particle physics.

From CERN, Aug. 4, 2020: Established in 2013, the CERN Neutrino Platform has enabled significant European participation in the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility and international, Fermilab-hosted Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, as well as the ICARUS neutrino experiment. These and other global experiments will refine physicists’ understanding of neutrino oscillations and help search for the existence of a possible fourth, “sterile” neutrino.