Bristol Particle Physics Consolidated Grant 2025-29

Physicists at the University of Bristol are building and operating particle detectors to hunt for dark matter, study rare particle decays, and design the next generation of colliders. The group works on five major experiments simultaneously: the CMS and LHCb detectors at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, the LZ dark matter experiment in a South Dakota gold mine, the Mu3e experiment searching for a forbidden muon decay, and the DUNE neutrino experiment in Illinois. They are also developing detector technology for future electron-positron colliders and high-intensity fixed-target experiments. This is fundamental science. The work addresses the biggest open questions in physics: what dark matter is made of, why matter dominates over antimatter in the universe, and whether the Standard Model of particle physics is complete. The Mu3e experiment, for example, looks for a muon decaying directly into three electrons—a process that is virtually impossible under current theory. If seen, it would be unambiguous evidence of new physics. The research has no immediate practical application. But the detector technologies developed here—radiation-hard sensors, fast readout electronics, and precision timing systems—often find unexpected uses in medical imaging, security scanning, and industrial monitoring, as similar fundamental particle physics work has done for decades.