people

What do particle accelerators and craggy outcrops have in common? Both have Tor Raubenheimer trotting the globe. Thanks to both his work at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and his passion for rock climbing, he has gotten to know people and places on several continents.

A dynamic duo at CERN is planting seeds to foster physics research in Nepal. Like many students in Nepal, they moved abroad to pursue the best higher education opportunities. Now, they are using their unique experiences working at CERN to bring some of these opportunities back to his home country.

Konstantinos Iakovidis was training in Greece’s Hellenic Army in May 2008 when his younger brother, George, was accepted into the CERN summer student program. When George told Konstantinos he had been invited to move to Switzerland for two months, he cried — and encouraged him to take the opportunity. Little did Konstantinos know that six years later, he would make his own journey to CERN and would eventually join his physicist brother on the same project, as a mechanical engineer.

Rakshya Khatiwada is an experimental astrophysicist at Fermilab working on dark matter searches and quantum science. When she’s not developing the newest detectors to look for dark matter, Khatiwada makes a point to engage with the next generation of scientists through informal lunches, talks and webinars.

From Physics World, April 23, 2019: Fermilab Archivist Valerie Higgins discusses how the contributions of support staff should not be forgotten when it comes to celebrating scientific breakthroughs. Modern scientific research is often conducted through large organizational structures and thousands of participants. For archivists and others interested in the history of scientific research, developing a complete picture requires an understanding not only of the work that scientists and technical staff do but also the contributions of support staff too.

Students come into science from a variety of backgrounds, facing a variety of circumstances. The Fisk-Vanderbilt Master’s-to-Ph.D. Bridge Program, a partnership between Fisk and Vanderbilt universities in Nashville, is meant to take that into account. It helps students overcome external hurdles to reach their potential in Ph.D.-level STEM research. Meet three scientists connected by the program.

Respondents to Symmetry’s survey about what it’s like to earn a Ph.D. in particle physics or astrophysics offer their views of the experience. Nearly 2,000 people worldwide complete the scientific rite of passage each year. Yet for many people, the process remains mysterious.
The more than 300 responses to Symmetry’s survey described a challenging, multifaceted experience that goes far beyond job training, and even beyond the scientific goal of studying the fundamental nature of the universe.

From Kyoto University, Feb. 27, 2019: In this five-minute video, University of Washington scientist and Fermilab collaborator Kim Siang Khaw explains Fermilab’s Muon g-2 experiment and how it may reveal unknown particles lurking in our universe.

If one wanted to follow the recipe for the universe, it would call for about 14 parts dark energy, 5 parts dark matter and 1 part visible matter. In a perpetually expanding cosmic landscape that reaches far beyond what even the most powerful telescopes can see, this might be hard to visualize. Physicists Katy Grimm and Katharine Leney found a solution for this: Use this recipe for the cosmos to bake a proportionally correct dark matter cake.

From University of Missouri – Kansas City’s University News, Feb. 6, 2019: Sánchez, a scientist at Iowa State University, is a part of Fermilab’s NOvA neutrino experiment and the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment. She also co-leads the ANNIE experiment at Fermilab.