On Sunday 26 February, CERN hosted the latest edition of Devoxx4kids, a series of computing, robotics and electronics workshops for kids. The event was organised in the context of the VoxxedDays CERN developers conference, held at CERN the previous day.

Various workshops - “Minis” for the 4-6 year-olds, “Kids” for the 7-10 year-olds and “Teens” for the 11-15 year-olds - gave the children an insight into programming and electronics through robots and games. About 70 children came along and were able to show off to their parents how they had managed to programme a NAO robot to have a converstation with them or a Thymio robot to follow a path on a map, or how they had altered the famous Minecraft game or developed an interactive quiz  on a computer using Scratch.

Devoxx4Kids was established in Antwerp, Belgium, on the fringes of the well-established Devoxx conference for Java programmers. Since its establishment, Devoxx4kids has brought smiles to thousands of children’s faces in 22 countries. Run by a team of volunteers headed by Xavier Bourguignon, the Swiss version of the conference is now into its eighth year. “Bringing Devoxx4kids to CERN and having it in the Globe is a dream come true!” says Xavier. Organising workshops in one of the high temples of science, where the Web was born, sends out a strong signal to the children (and their parents). I hope Devoxx4kids will often come back to CERN in the future.”

Joao Silva, organiser of Voxxed Days CERN and CERN coordinator of Devoxx4kids adds: “The aim of the workshops is to stimulate curiosity and the imagination, and to show what can be done with science and technology. These workshops lead the children to discover that, through games, they can be the creators of tomorrow. Education is one of CERN’s core missions, so hosting an event like Devoxx4kids here is entirely consistent with our work. And we look forward to hosting it again!”

2016 was a remarkably successful year for CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC), marked by excellent peak performance, good availability and operational flexibility (CERN Courier, December 2016, p.5). Targeting further improvement, a thorough review of LHC operation and system performance was the focus of discussions in the first phase of the annual LHC performance workshop, which took place from 23 to 26 January in Chamonix, France.

Experts from the accelerator sector, CERN management and members of the CERN Machine Advisory Committee explored
 the operational scenarios for the remainder
 of Run 2 and made preliminary decisions regarding optics and machine parameters. Beam is due back in the LHC this year at the beginning of May, and the rest of the year will essentially be dedicated to proton–proton physics, with the usual mix of machine development and special physics runs. By quantifying the limitations to peak luminosity from electron-cloud effects, the cryogenics system and other factors, luminosity estimates for the coming years were also drawn up: in 2017, the peak luminosity should be at least 1.7 × 10³⁴ cm^–2 s^–1 and the integrated luminosity target for ATLAS and CMS is 45 fb^–1.

One open question about future LHC operations concerns the increase of the beam energy from 6.5 to 7 TeV per beam, which would see the machine reach its design specification. To gain input on high-yield magnet behaviour, a dipole training campaign was conducted at the start of the year-end technical stop (CERN Courier March 2017 p9). Experience from this and previous training campaigns was reviewed and the duration, timing and associated risks of pushing up to 7 TeV – including implications for other accelerator systems, such as the LHC beam dump – were explored. There will be no change of beam energy in 2017 and 2018. The goal is to prepare the LHC to run at 14 TeV during Run 3 with the experiments expressing
a clear preference to make the change in energy in a single step.

Regarding the longer-term future of
the LHC, the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) demands challenging proton and ion beam parameters from the injector complex. The LHC injector upgrade 
(LIU) project is charged with planning
and executing wide-ranging upgrades to the complex to meet these requirements. Both the LIU and HL-LHC projects have come through a recent cost-and-schedule review, and at present are fully funded and on schedule. The injector upgrades will be deployed during Long Shutdown 2 (LS2) in 2019-2020, while the HL-LHC will see the major part of its upgrades implemented in LS3, which is due to start in 2024.

With only two more years of operation before the next long shutdown, planning for LS2 is already well advanced. For the LHC itself, LS2 will not require the same level of intervention as seen in LS1. Nonetheless, here is still a major amount of work planned across the complex including major upgrades to the injectors in the framework of LIU, and significant upgrades to the LHC experiments.

The exploitation of the LHC and the injector complex has been impressive recently, but work across the Organization continues unabated in the push to get the best out of the LHC in both the medium and long term.

Karl Jakobs from the University of Freiburg is a familiar face at CERN and in the ATLAS Experiment. He’s been part of the collaboration since the signing of the ATLAS Letter of Intent in 1992, having taken on various coordination roles, and followed the experiment through all its phases. Now, after twenty-five years with the collaboration, Karl is moving into the main office as spokesperson.

New priorities

Karl and his new management team will have to hit the ground running. “The next two years will be quite demanding,” explains Karl. “We are facing many challenges in parallel: operating the detector under increasing LHC luminosity, and efficiently collecting and analysing the data – all the while we continue ramping-up work on our extensive upgrade projects.”

In preparation for Run 3 of the LHC, ATLAS teams are working on “Phase I” upgrades to be installed in two years’ time. In parallel, teams are developing much larger “Phase II” upgrades, in preparation for the High-Luminosity LHC. This is a massive endeavour that will require the complete redesign and construction of certain ATLAS sub-detectors. “Although these developments may seem a long way off, extensive planning is needed early on in order to have the Phase II detectors ready for installation in 2024,” says Karl. “Given the importance of the upgrade projects, Kevin Einsweiler (Berkeley LBNL), the ATLAS Upgrade Coordinator, joins our management team. In addition, Ludovico Pontecorvo (CERN) and Fido Dittus (CERN) will continue in their roles as Technical and Resources Coordinators.”

Maintaining excellence

Along with this extensive upgrade work, the new ATLAS Management is committed to maintaining the standards the world has come to expect. “The Collaboration has strived to perform high quality physics analyses; this is something we want to keep up, even with our growing number of priorities,” says Andreas Hoecker (CERN), new ATLAS deputy spokesperson. “As we continue to take and analyse the 13 TeV data during Run 2, our physics priorities will be shifting towards measurements and searches that need higher integrated luminosities.”

“Together with the Technical Coordinator, we look to ensure on-going excellent operation and performance of the experiment,” says Isabelle Wingerter-Seez (Annecy LAPP), new ATLAS deputy spokesperson. “This includes preparing the full chain - from taking the data, to their processing and analysis - to take full benefit of the increasing luminosity.”

A Fresh Start

High-energy physics experiments are relay races with far-reaching timelines. Now is the moment for the baton to be passed along. “We are fortunate to be building on the excellent structures already in place,” says Karl. “Dave Charlton and his team have done a fantastic job over the past four years, and have been extremely supportive during the transition.”

GBAR starts with a straight line: on 1 March the experiment installed its first component – a linear accelerator.

GBAR (Gravitational Behaviour of Antihydrogen at Rest) is an antimatter experiment that will measure the freefall of antihydrogen atoms in the Earth’s gravitational field. How antimatter reacts to gravity is one of the fundamental questions of physics yet to be answered. While theories exist as to whether it will behave like matter or not, so far only a proof of principle experiment has been performed by the ALPHA collaboration.

Located in the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) hall, GBAR is the first of five experiments that will be connected to the new ELENA (Extra Low ENergy Antiproton) deceleration ring. It will use antiprotons supplied by ELENA and positrons created by the newly installed linac to produce antihydrogen ions (antihydrogen atoms with one additional positron).

In sharp contrast to the LHC’s chain of big accelerators and fast particles, the world of antimatter is small and its particles are as slow as they come. The GBAR linac is only 1.2 metres long. It produces electrons and accelerates them to 10 MeV, towards a tungsten target. In the collision, positrons for the antihydrogen ions are created and are later trapped by a magnetic field.

Before they are turned into antihydrogen ions, the antiprotons go through several stages of energy reduction. Starting with a 5.3 MeV antiproton beam in the AD, ELENA reduces the energy by a factor of 50 to just 100 KeV. In April 2016, GBAR will be equipped with its own decelerator, which will bring down the energy of the antiprotons to just 1 KeV.

“With the positrons from the linac, we will create a cloud of electron-positron pairs, called positroniums. When the antiprotons from ELENA pass through the positronium target, they will catch positrons and turn into antihydrogen ions,” explains Patrice Pérez, GBAR’s spokesperson. Indeed, positrons and electrons can very briefly bind together into an exotic atom before annihilating.

While antihydrogen ions are much harder to produce than antihydrogen atoms, their positive charge makes them significantly easier to manipulate. With the help of lasers, their velocity will be reduced to half a metre per second. This will allow them to be navigated to a fixed point. Then, trapped by an electric field, one of their positrons will be removed with lasers, which will make them neutral again. The only force acting on them at this point will be gravity and they will be free to make a 20-centimetre fall, during which researchers will observe their behaviour.

The technology at GBAR has never been used before, which makes it a pioneering experiment. According to the schedule, by September 2018 the installation of all parts will be completed and recording of the first data can begin.

The results might turn out to be very exciting. As Pérez explains: “Einstein’s Equivalence Principle states that the trajectory of a particle is independent of its composition and internal structure when it is only submitted to gravitational forces. If we find out that gravity has a different effect on antimatter, this would mean that he was wrong and that we know very little about the universe.”

Five other experiments are installed at the Antiproton Decelerator, two of which – AEGIS and ALPHA– are also studying the effect of gravity on antimatter.

The 2017 extended year-end technical stop (EYETS) is about to come to an end. Presently, the LHC magnets are being cooled down again, and then the powering tests will take place.

On 14 April, the LHC will be handed back to the operations teams, and in early May the first bunches with protons will be injected again. A beam intensity ramp-up will follow, which should bring the LHC to the level of performance experienced at the end of last year’s proton run by mid-June. The 2017 LHC proton physics run will then end in mid-December.

No ions are planned for the LHC in 2017. However, for the first time this year, xenon ions will be accelerated by Linac3 through LEIR, the PS and the SPS for use in the North Area experimental areas during an eight-week ion run in November and December. To accomplish this, the Linac3 ion source has been converted to a xenon ion source,  commissioning of which started during the first week of March.

This year’s extended technical stop has been an opportunity to perform “open-heart surgery” on the CMS detector to replace the pixel tracker as well as an enormous amount of other work throughout the entire accelerator complex.

In the LHC, regular maintenance and repairs were performed in parallel to the replacement of a superconducting dipole magnet in sector 1-2, which went according to planning.

Much work was accomplished on the injector side too: a massive de-cabling campaign in the PS Booster and the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) has paved the way for the installation of new equipment for the LHC Injector Upgrade (LIU) project. The project will gradually be deployed in the coming years and it will culminate during long shutdown 2 (LS2).

A new internal beam dump was installed in the SPS during the second week of March. This was in response to a problem that occurred in April last year, during the preparation of the LHC beam in the SPS, when a vacuum leak developed in the SPS internal beam dump, limiting the number of LHC bunches per extraction out of the SPS to 96 for the entire 2016 run. Since then, a heroic effort has been made to re-design and produce a new internal beam dump, which was finally installed on Tuesday, 8 March and which will allow the SPS to reach its full performance again for the 2017 run.

The Linac2 proton source has been functioning again since the end of February. On Friday, 10 March, the Linac2 was closed for hardware commissioning to be followed by commissioning with beam. These are the first steps to get the whole LHC proton injection chain up and running again for another busy (and hopefully successful) year.

At the beginning of March, the CMS collaboration successfully replaced part of the heart of its detector: its silicon pixel tracking system. This system, a 4-layer cylindrical device with 124 million pixels, is the innermost part of the CMS detector and starts the trajectory measurement of charged particles emerging from proton-proton collisions at the centre of the experiment.

The original Pixel Tracker was designed for a lower collision rate than the LHC will deliver in the coming years. Therefore, between 28 February and 7 March, it has been replaced with a brand-new device, as one of the activities of the Extended Year-End Technical Stop (EYETS). In fact, the Pixel Tracker’s upgrade is the schedule driver for the overall CERN EYETS planning and its successful installation is another important milestone in a busy but productive period for the collaboration.

The older Pixel Tracker had three layers in the central barrel region (called BPIX), capped by two disks at each end (named FPIX). Its replacement, which has an additional layer throughout, is primarily designed to help CMS deal with the increasing rate of collisions. These additional layers of tracking will also help CMS better establish where the individual collisions occurred and better trace the trajectories of produced particles. This enhanced performance will improve the precision with which predictions of the Standard Model can be measured, including the theorised properties of the Higgs boson.

Preparations for the installation of the second-generation Pixel Tracker began as early as Long Shutdown 1 (LS1). The innermost layer of the new BPIX is intended to sit even closer to the collision point than before. To accommodate this configuration, the central section of the LHC beam pipe was replaced during LS1 with a narrower version. Earlier this year, the original Pixel Tracker was removed from within CMS and stored in a radiation-protection environment on the surface at Point 5.

On Tuesday, 28 February, one half of the new BPIX was installed around the beam pipe. The BPIX was built by a consortium of nine laboratories in Europe, and finally assembled at PSI in Switzerland. The BPIX had been transported to CERN a few weeks previously and stored in a clean room on the surface at Point 5 prior to installation. On the Tuesday morning, the first of the two halves was lowered through the 100-metre-deep shaft onto the floor of the CMS underground experimental cavern before being raised onto the operational platform and inserted into position; it was followed by the second half on Thursday, 2 March. Once each half was in place, the respective electronics and cooling systems had to be connected in preparation for data taking. The remaining components – the FPIX consisting of three disks on each side of the collision point, built in the US – were installed at the beginning of March.

The upgraded Pixel Tracker will operate until the early stages of the High-Luminosity LHC, when a third-generation device will replace it.

On Thursday, 2 March, Pathé cinema at Balexert, in collaboration with 20^th Century Fox and CERN, hosted an advanced screening of the movie Hidden Figures, followed by a debate on the position of women in science.

The film tells the story of three African-American female scientists who played key roles in the United States’ space conquest, contributing in particular to the preparations for putting astronaut John Glenn into orbit. African-American Ayana Arce (ATLAS) contributed to the event via a recorded interview that was shown before the film. After the film, Maite Barroso Lopez (IT department), Stéphanie Beauceron (CMS), Anne-Marie Magnan (CMS) and Andry Rakotozafindrabe (ALICE) shared their experiences and their visions with the audience in a debate moderated by science journalist Tania Chytil.

They answered questions about the alleged rivalry amongst women, about whether there is a link between CERN and NASA as pictured in the film, and about their mentors. They also recalled awkward situations in their careers. For example, one day, when visiting CMS with Stéphanie Beauceron, a journalist asked the press officer accompanying them when she would meet the CMS physicist for the interview, even though she had actually been talking to her – yes, her – for the past hour. Another time, a thesis supervisor scrutinised Anne-Marie Magnan and claimed that “being a woman and being short, you will never make it”. Women’s toilets can also be tricky to find, since in some buildings they are on a different level – or not there at all, as experienced by Andry Rakotozafindrabe.  Unsurprisingly, the key conclusion of the evening was that mentors, parents, teachers and thesis supervisors all play a big role in many decisions. Yet in all cases, the members of the panel unanimously agreed that female students should never give up their dream of pursuing a career in science or technology. The good attendance at this event is a sign that the general public is definitely interested in such topics. Approximately half of the audience stayed for the post-film debate.

Maite Barroso Lopez and Anne-Marie Magnan were also interviewed by cinema journalist Raphaële Bouchet from RTS for a podcast, available here (in French). (Image: Clara Nellist)

A hub for top-notch scientists, engineers and professionals from all corners of the world, CERN is an ideal place to explore and get started new business ideas, to discover exciting technologies and to build a skilled, diverse start-up team. Creating platforms where people can meet is an important part of facilitating entrepreneurship here at CERN, and through initiatives such as THE Port, Challenge Based Innovation (CBI), the Entrepreneurship Meet-ups and the Knowledge Transfer seminars, future change-makers meet and opportunities are created.

Many incredible start-ups have already been founded thanks to those initiatives. Read about them here. 

On Tuesday 21 March 2017, recently-recruited staff members and fellows participated in a session in the framework of the Induction Programme. (Image: S. Bennett/CERN)

Over the years, we have tried and succeeded in using a number of different methods to educate people on computer security problems and issues: posters, videos, courses, presentations, monthly reports, and Bulletin articles. We would now like to step up a level and introduce haptic feedback for unsecure user actions. Enter: the “Digital Feedback Keyboard” (DFK).

Today, using a computer does not come without risks. Browsing to the wrong webpage, opening a malicious attachment or downloading a bad plugin or software can quickly infect your computer, destroy its inherent defences and render you, your work, your data and subsequently CERN completely naked and unprotected (see for example “Drive Bye” or “One click and boom”). An attacker “owning“ your computer in such a way also owns your computing account as, usually, such attackers install malware on your computer which will log any keystroke you make (including your account’s password), enable your webcam and microphone to spy on you, search through your hard disk for juicy documents and, if there is nothing better, try to extort some money from you (“Ransomware - when it is too late...").

It is generally very difficult to spot those risky actions. “Stop, think, do not click!” does not always enter into our minds promptly. Hence, with these new DF keyboards, a user will get direct feedback from unsecure actions through a series of small electrodes integrated into the keys. These electrodes will distribute a short spike of a few volts for potentially dangerous actions like opening an infected attachment, typing your CERN password into a non-CERN-owned webpage or browsing to a malicious webpage. Higher voltages can be expected when opening applications which directly violate CERN’s Computing Rules or are illegal, such as software using pirated licenses (“Do you have 30 kCHF pocket money?”) or violating copyright (“Protect CERN --- Respect Copyrights”). After a while, such electric feedback will help you subconsciously to practice “Stop, think, do not click!”. “It is basically like teaching cows not to touch the fence by using electric wires,” says Chris Lloyd from the IT procurement team.

A first pilot phase will start on 1 April, with about 100 users randomly selected from among all members of the personnel. As other CERN services have already expressed their interest for their particular use cases (e.g. for eLearning, MERIT appraisals, expensive purchasing), the pilot might quickly be expanded throughout CERN. The CERN procurement team and IT department are currently investigating how to efficiently roll out and distribute DF keyboards to every single user. If you prefer not to join this pilot phase for now, just start to practice “Stop, think, do not click!” now. Please beware of strange e-mails sent to you – learn how to identify malicious e-mails – and do not click on random links just because you find them appealing. Better think first and refrain from clicking.

Do you want to learn more about computer security incidents and issues at CERN? Follow our Monthly Report. For further information, questions or help, visit our website or contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.

You may, or may not, have heard that CERN is rebuilding its digital portfolio (a.k.a. the home.cern website, and the way all websites using the CERN theme look). The decision was made because our current website isn’t doing what we need it to anymore and it already (despite only being five years old) looks dated.  As the birthplace of the web we think CERN deserves something new!

The project was kicked off last month with an event hosted by Everis, the company helping us to build the new digital portfolio. Everis have used what they learnt there to put together a short quiz to help us understand what people want from the CERN website, and how best we can get that information to them. Please share it with everyone you know. We’ll be updating everyone about the web project processes in a blog, stay tuned for more information.

You can take the quiz here:https://everis-exd.typeform.com/to/EYXuGv

The Extended Year-End Technical stop (EYETS) this year is special for many reasons. One full sector of the LHC, sector 1-2 – the arc between point 1 (ATLAS) and point 2 (ALICE) –  was warmed up to room temperature to allow the replacement of one of the 15-metre-long superconducting dipole magnets, which had exhibited abnormal behaviour on a few occasions during the 2016 physics run.

Also, at the beginning of the EYETS, just before the Christmas break, the LHC was emptied of its precious coolant, liquid helium. Most of the helium inventory (130 tonnes) in the LHC was removed from the tunnel and securely stored in CERN’s surface premises, while a small fraction was stored at the helium suppliers’ premises, to allow for a certain degree of operational flexibility. The temperature of the LHC magnets – except for those in sector 1-2 – was maintained at approximately 20 Kelvin (-253 degrees Celsius). The decision to keep the sectors at 20 Kelvin and remove the helium from the LHC tunnel was taken in order to secure the helium inventory from any major operational issue during the Christmas closure period.

Following the successful replacement of the dipole magnet in sector 1-2, the re-connection of all electrical and cryogenic services and the closure of the interconnections, pre-cooling of the sector started on Friday, 17 February. Sixty thermally insulated trucks transporting a total of 1200 tonnes of liquid nitrogen were required to complete this first cool-down phase and to reach a temperature of 80 Kelvin (-193 degrees Celsius) by Saturday, 4 March.

The re-filling of the arcs with liquid helium started about 1 week later and, if all goes according to schedule, the arcs will gradually become available for electrical quality assurance (ELQA) tests between 30 March and 3 April. These ELQA tests are coordinated by the Machine Protection and Electrical Integrity group (TE-MPE) within the Technology (TE) department. Powering tests will then follow, carried out by a collaboration of people from the Electrical Power Converters group (TE-EPC), the Machine Protection and Electrical Integrity group (TE-MPE) and the Operations group (BE-OP). The last phase before commissioning with beam is machine check-out, coordinated by BE-OP in close collaboration with all equipment and service groups.

The next challenge for the cryo team is to measure the maximum thermal power they can charge to the beam screens, in order to cross-check the refrigeration performance of the system. Following the completion of these tests, operational activities will not diminish for the cryogenics team. With a foreseen increase in the number of bunches in the LHC and longer bunch trains coming from the SPS in 2017, more heat will be deposited in the cryogenics circuits: this will require further regulation adjustments and optimisation of the refrigeration power.

Yet another success in the creating of a bright future for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) was achieved when, on 27 February 2017, the first tests of a new kind of radio-frequency (RF) cavity – crab cavities – were performed. They are one of the key elements for the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) project – the future upgrade of the LHC, which will be operational from 2025.

Constructed from high-purity niobium sheets, the crab cavities will operate at 2 Kelvin to reach their nominal performance. Unlike the accelerating RF cavities at LHC Point 4, the crab cavities give the bunches a time-dependent transverse kick in a plane that is perpendicular to their motion. The present configuration of the LHC interaction regions, and that of the future HL-HLC, features an intrinsic crossing angle with which the beams collide. By placing the crab cavities near the interaction regions of ATLAS and CMS, the bunches are rotated around their barycentres in order to maximise their overlap at the collision points.

So far, two superconducting crab cavities have been manufactured at CERN. RF tests at their operating temperature of 2 K were performed in a super-fluid helium bath in the SM18 test facility. The first cavity tests demonstrated a maximum voltage reach in excess of 5 MV transverse kick voltage, surpassing the nominal operational voltage of 3.4 MV. This kick voltage corresponds to extremely high electric and magnetic fields on the cavity surfaces: 57 MV/m and 104 mT respectively.

By the end of 2017, the two crab cavities will have been inserted into a specially designed cryomodule. During the next year-end technical stop, the cryomodule will be installed in the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS), where it will undergo validation tests with proton beams. This will be the first time that a crab cavity has ever been used for manipulating proton beams. In total, 16 crab cavities will be installed in the High-Luminosity LHC – eight near ATLAS and eight near CMS.

“With the tests in the SPS, we want to make sure that the proton beams can be injected and accelerated and establish stable circulating proton beams with the crab cavities in operation. We want to manipulate the parameters of the crab cavities like we would in the LHC,” explains Rama Calaga, the RF physicist behind the technology and currently leader of the crab cavity work package within the HL-LHC project. 

The 52^nd Rencontres de Moriond conference is taking place in La Thuile, Italy, from the 18 March to 1 April. The first week, which ran until 25 March, was devoted to the theme "Electroweak interactions and unified theories", and the second session is based on the theme of “QCD and high energy interaction”.

The four main experiments at CERN have been presenting many fresh results, including the first ones with full statistics – that is, including the full 13 TeV dataset available so far. These latest results were able to benefit from the exceptional performance of the LHC and accelerator complex in 2016, which was far beyond expectations. The final integrated luminosity – indicating the cumulative number of potential collisions – totalled around 40 fb^-1 each in ATLAS and CMS (whereas the target for the whole year was 25 fb^-1). This represents the highest amount of data ever collected at any hadron collider in history. Moreover, thanks to an exceptional machine availability, and several new ideas and production techniques incorporated in the operation of LHC, the instantaneous peak luminosity topped out at around 1.4 x 10³⁴ cm^-2s^-1, 40% above the design value.

The 2016 has been the first full year of data-taking at a beam energy of 6.5 TeV, therefore the highest collision energy ever reached at a particle collider.

ATLAS

The ATLAS collaborationhas presented first resultsobtained with a new dataset that is almost three times larger than that available at the time of the last ICHEP conference, held in August 2016. This significant increase in data volume has enabled many searches for new physics beyond the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics. Among the key highlights were the results of searches for supersymmetric particles, which have now excluded particle masses reaching 2 TeV for the first time.

Searches for heavy particles decaying to "jets" of hadron particles probe the structure of quarks at energies never reached before, setting lower limits for their masses at 6 TeV. Searches for the rare Higgs boson decay to two muons, which test the fundamental SM prediction of different Higgs-boson-to-lepton couplings for different lepton generations, are now approaching the sensitivity required to observe a signal. Many results from precise measurements of the properties of the known SM particles were also shown, including the first measurement of the mass of the W boson with similar precision to the previous best result from a single experiment.

The measurement tests the SM via so-called virtual corrections through the interplay between the W boson, top-quark and Higgs-boson masses, all precisely measured by ATLAS. In both the cases of new particle searches and precision measurements, no significant deviations from SM predictions have been observed, allowing stringent constraints to be placed on theories of new physics. 

CMS

The CMS collaboration has presented more than 35 new results, most of which used the full 2016 dataset. The analysis of the Higgs boson decaying into four leptons or two photons channels has provided new measurements of total and differential cross sections, which result in agreement with Standard Model expectations within current uncertainties. The four-lepton analysis also provides a new measurement of the Higgs mass, which is more precise than the current world average measurement from Run 1.

Searches for associated top-Higgs production in final states with multiple leptons have provided direct evidence for the existence of a top quark-Higgs coupling, and the measured signal strength is consistent with standard model expectations.

The measurement of the angular coefficient P5' in the flavor-changing neutral current decay of B mesons is in agreement with theoretical predictions and compatible with previous LHCb results of a similar study. The first measurement of the top-quark mass and an updated measurement of the ZZ total and differential cross sections with full Run 2 statistics were also presented. CMS has also released more than twenty direct searches for new physics using the full 2016 data sample. The search for electro-weakly interacting supersymmetric particles in final states containing multiple leptons, for the first time, probes masses beyond 1 TeV.

The exotic searches have also provided stringent new limits on many scenarios including dark matter, new types of quarks, vector bosons and gravitons.

LHCb

The LHCb collaboration presented several important new results. Besides an update of the measurement of the rarest decay of a particle containing a b quark ever observed, and the exceptional observation of a new system of five particles all in a single analysis, the LHCb collaboration presented the most precise single measurement of the CP-violating phase φ_s which sets the scale for the difference between properties of matter and antimatter for particles made up of b and s quarks, known as B_s mesons, using the full Run 1 data set.

Furthermore,the results of an unprecedented study were shown for the first time: collisions between protons and helium nuclei injected near the interaction points were exploited to measure the production rate of antiprotons, providing an important input to searches for dark-matter signals in space.

ALICE

The ALICE collaboration has presented recent results from large samples of proton-proton (p-p), lead-lead (Pb-Pb), and proton-lead (p-Pb) collisions collected in 2015 and 2016. One of the new results concerns the azimuthal asymmetry of the production of J/Psi mesons: the results show conclusively that heavy quarks directly “feel” the shape and size of the interaction region of nucleus-nucleus collisions where an asymmetric quark-gluon plasma medium – mostly made of light quarks and gluons – is produced.

Also, ALICE has shown results on the azimuthal distributions of pions, kaons, protons, and phi mesons in Pb-Pb collisions, which allow to determine the pressure and density in the quark gluon plasma. In addition, several results were presented on the multiplicity dependence of particle production showing that some of the effects that are attributed to quark-gluon plasma formation in Pb-Pb collisions are also seen in high-multiplicity p-p collisions. This result represents a tantalising hint that a quark-gluon plasma may even occasionally be formed in collisions of protons.

The intensive programme consisted of talks and case studies, as well as excursions to nearby sites.

The topics covered included: electromagnetism, relativity and the basics of beam dynamics, different injection and extraction schemes, special magnetic and electrostatic elements for the case of lepton and hadron beams, the technical layout of state-of-the-art kicker and septa designs, and the special features of resonant extraction, as used in machines for medical applications.

For the case studies, students were divided into small groups to complete a number of design tasks. This not only provided an opportunity for applying the theoretical knowledge to real-life problems, but also an opportunity to discuss the topic in detail with the lecturers and tutors. The students presented their results on the final afternoon of the school and thoroughly enjoyed these practical sessions, reflecting the high standard of this CAS.

The course was held at the Ettore Majorana Foundation and Center in Erice, and was attended by 72 participants of 25 nationalities, from countries as far away as China, Iran, Russia and the United States. In addition to the academic programme, the students had the opportunity to take part in an all-day excursion to the Segesta and Selinunte temples, which was highly appreciated by all those who participated.

The next CAS course will be an Advanced Accelerator Physics course, to be held at the Royal Holloway University of London Campus, Egham, UK from 3 to 15 September 2017 and a Joint School on RF Technologies to be held in Hayama, Kanagawa, Japan from 16 to 26 October 2017.

Further information on forthcoming CAS courses can be found on the CAS website (https://www.cern.ch/schools/CAS).

CERN attended the United Nations’ Geneva Global Goals innovation Day (G3iD) to show how CERN tackles UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) came into force in 2016, each one with specific targets to be met over the next 15 years to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. These ambitious Goals are part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by world leaders to transform our world.

By pursuing its core mission and fulfilling its current mandate, CERN is de-facto contributing to the implementation of five SDGs, namely 3, 4, 9, 16 and 17 (see here below). At the G3iD event CERN showed what the Organization is doing today to address these goals, and invited people to suggest how it can contribute further to the SDGs.

CERN’s contribution was a positive surprise for many participants, as the Organization’s impact on society and undertaking in pursuing these global challenges are still not widely known to the public.

SDG 3: Good health and well-being. The technologies, know-how, and scientific advances behind high-energy physics have historically contributed to the field of medical and biomedical applications. Future developments at CERN will continue to help address global societal challenges in healthcare; within therapy, medical imaging, medical and biomedical research and technology.

SDG 4: Quality education. CERN aims to inspire the rising generation of new scientists, and contributes to making high quality skills available to its Member States through a diverse range of programmes for students, teachers and young researchers.

SDG 9: Industry, innovation and infrastructure. Reaching ambitious scientific objectives requires the development of new technologies, making CERN a driver of innovation. The CERN Knowledge Transfer group provides advice, support, training, network and infrastructure to ease the transfer of CERN’s know-how to industry and eventually society. In addition, nearly half of CERN’s annual budget returns to industry, and contracts with CERN help industry drive their innovation.

SDG 16: Peace, justice and strong institutions. For more than 60 years, CERN has provided a framework for peaceful scientific collaboration. Moreover, CERN is an accountable and transparent institution, ensuring participatory and representative decision-making, as well as public access to information.

SDG 17: Partnership for the goals. CERN has become a model for global cooperation and has paved the way for other institutions combining scientific excellence with science diplomacy. At CERN, 16 000 scientists from over 110 nations work together, regardless of religious and political views.

Aiming to accelerate the achievement of the SDGs, the Geneva Global Goals innovation Day (G3iD) took place on March 24th in Geneva. G3iD’s SDG Solutions Fair had over 60 organizations participating and was a place for showcasing and exploring solutions to SDG-related challenges. 

Afroditi Anastasaki, Barbora Bruant Gulejova, Tiago de Araujo, Victoria Emilie Isern, Olivier Martin, Ranveig Strom

Browsing the World Wide Web is not as easy as it seems… One wrong click and all your passwords (CERN, Facebook, PayPal, Amazon, etc.) could be stolen; all your activities could be clandestinely monitored (mouse movements and clicks, words typed, screenshots, microphone and webcam recordings, etc.); confidential documents could be stolen; and an attack path (a so-called back-door) into CERN could be opened… As a result, you would have to reinstall your computer from scratch and change all your passwords! One of our colleagues learned this the hard way. One wrong click in summer 2015 permitted malicious attackers to infiltrate CERN but, fortunately, no real damage was done. Still, the cost of investigating the incident ran to several tens of thousands of Swiss francs and a lot of time was wasted trying to understand the attacker’s intent and the extent of the infiltration...

With the goal of increasing more awareness of the risk of clicking on links in unsolicited e-mails, the Computer Security Team recently re-ran the “Clicking Campaign”, sending fake e-mails to you and your (our) colleagues, intended to lure you into clicking on the embedded link. Once an unfortunate, imprudent victim clicks, they are led to an informative webpage explaining “how to identify malicious e-mails” (see the image). Of course, this click rate is proportional to how sophisticated and well-targeted the e-mail is: the more convincing the look and content of the e-mail, the higher the probability of a click (up to a point where a distinction is possible only by experts). Therefore, in order not to be biased (we can easily design e-mails which you will definitely click), we reused the fake e-mails designed for us by students at the University of Rotterdam for last year’s campaign). Then, their boundary condition was to use only information that is publicly available from CERN’s webpages or from their own imaginations. Still, the results were frightening. Some suggestions were so well-designed that more or less everyone at CERN receiving them would have clicked. Experts would call this a sophisticated and targeted attack, a so-called Advanced Persistent Threat (APT). In the end, we selected five fake e-mail suggestions that we deemed to be basic, simple and "easily" identifiable as malicious by the recipients…

The click rates, however, told a different story. Once more, we got an average click rate of 18% (comparable to last year’s number)! One in five recipients clicked on the link… If those e-mails had been real malicious messages, clicking would have meant: computer infected, all local activities monitored, password stolen, data lost and an attack platform into CERN opened. That one click could have had severe operational and financial consequences for CERN... So if you fell for this scam, and our sincerest apologies if you did, let us explain to you how you can better identify such e-mails and what consequences clicking on such a malicious link might have for you and your digital assets:

On the positive side, many people identified those fake e-mails for what they were: malicious. We got hundreds of ServiceNow tickets notifying us of "some malicious mails going around". Well done, folks! In any case, stay vigilant and take care. Only click once you are sure. If you are in doubt, contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.

And keep in mind: we might run a similar campaign next year with some more sophisticated e-mail messages…

Do you want to learn more about computer security incidents and issues at CERN? Follow our Monthly Report. For further information, questions or help, visit our website or contact us at Computer.Security@cern.ch.

On 4 April, CERN alumnus Sir Tim Berners-Lee received the 2016 ACM A.M. Turing Award. The award is given by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and it is often referred to as the "Nobel Prize" of computing.

In 1989, while working at CERN, Berners-Lee wrote a proposal for a new information management system for the Laboratory. By the end of the following year he had developed the fundamental protocols and produced the first web server and browser: he had invented the World Wide Web. Considered one of the most influential computing innovations in history, the World Wide Web is the primary tool used by billions of people every day to communicate, access information, engage in commerce and perform many other important activities. On 12 March this year, the web had its 28^th anniversary. On this occasion Berners-Lee, who is now a Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Oxford, and director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and the World Wide Web Foundation, published an open letter on how the web has evolved.

The A.M. Turing Award carries a $1 million prize, with financial support provided by Google, Inc. It was named in honour of Alan M. Turing (1912–1954), a British mathematician and computer scientist. Turing made fundamental advances in computer architecture, algorithms, formalisation of computing and artificial intelligence. He was also a key contributor to the Allied cryptanalysis of the Enigma cipher during World War II.

When all the accelerators stop for the annual year-end technical stop (YETS), the accelerator operators get a well-deserved break. But this is not the case for the operators in the Technical Infrastructure section of the Operation group of the Beams department (BE-OP-TI), who are working in shifts 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, monitoring CERN's infrastructures.

The Technical Infrastructure (TI) operators look after machine buildings, accelerators, experiments and other important or critical CERN facilities, like the computer centre. They monitor alarms for everything: from the incoming 400 kV electrical supply to individual circuit breakers, from the fire and gas safety, cooling and ventilation systems, to more specific installations such as the cryogenics for the experiments and the environmental systems.

The operators act as first responders and it is also their responsibility to prioritise and report faults and interventions. Not only do they monitor the infrastructure, but they also track and arrange maintenance activities on all systems.

When the accelerator complex is stopped, a huge amount of maintenance is done on all the technical infrastructure, and therefore the year-end technical stop is the busiest period of the year in the Technical Infrastructure Control Room.

As the operators are often in contact with a large number of technicians working on many different systems, and with people contacting the TI team to request repairs for malfunctioning equipment, a good measure of the activity in the Technical Infrastructure control room is the amount of phone calls. As seen in the picture below, the EYETS is very easy to detect from the amount of phone calls in that period.

During this very busy period, when many interventions are happening at the same time, breakdowns are also inevitable, and this year was no exception. On 9 March, a general power cut occurred, taking out the power supply all around CERN. The TI team coordinated the work of all the technicians intervening throughout CERN and quickly returned everything to normal. Needless to say, it was a busy day in the Technical Infrastructure control room.

When the machine is stopped, a good deal of effort also goes into upgrading all the relevant control systems and, during this period, whole new installations are commissioned. Operators will need to be trained in these new systems and tools, writing new procedures and operating the installations, with the help of the experts. Since many new or renovated installations appear after each technical stop, thus adding to the list of new alarms to configure, the number of synoptic panels in the TI control room is constantly growing.

Over the past few weeks, the accelerator complex has been getting ready to restart. The biggest challenge for the Technical Infrastructure team is now to make sure that all the systems that were undergoing maintenance are started up properly, and that all the alarms are put back into service accordingly. The team is ready for when the beam comes knocking on the door in the not-too-distant future.

At the end of March, the first sectors of the LHC became available, allowing the restart of the power converters and the performance of electrical quality assurance tests (ELQA), which are now in full swing. In the coming days, the “patrols” will be completed, ensuring that no persons remain in the tunnel before it is closed and the access control and safety system is activated. This will be followed by the Departmental Safety Officer (DSO) tests on 7 April, after which the hardware permit and later the beam permit can be signed.

On the injectors side, LINAC2 is operating and has accelerated the beam up to 50 MeV, nearly ready for the PS Booster to take beam in the week of 10 April. The PS Booster’s heart is beating again following recommissioning of the main power supply. The SPS was closed on Friday, 24 March and tests and adjustments on the renovated power converters are ongoing. The PS was one of the last machines to be closed, on Friday, 31 March, and many tests are in progress on various equipment to ensure that everything will be ready in time for injection of beam into this machine, planned for Easter Monday.