Fresno State joined ATLAS experiment in 2007 as the only CSU campus on ATLAS or CMS, the two flagship LHC experiments designed to search for new physics beyond current known physics framework. Fresno State was the only CSU campus involved in the Higgs discovery. This was also the first research a CSU campus was involved in which has resulted in a Nobel Prize. Fresno State ATLAS program currently consists of one faculty (Prof. Yongsheng Gao) and several graduate and undergraduate students. In 2014 and 2017, CSU Sacramento and CSU East Bay hired new ATLAS faculty Dr. Joshua Moss and Dr. Kathryn Grimm to start their ATLAS programs. With approval from CERN and ATLAS during summer of 2015, the institution name of Freso State ATLAS program at CERN was changed from "California State University, Fresno" to "California State University" to include these 3 CSU campuses. Every summer since 2008, except the 3 summers during Covid-19, we have been sending 5 to 12 CSU students to work at CERN on ATLAS research. Since 2016, we have been sending ~12 CSU students to work at CERN each summer, thanks to two NSF IRES grants. Over 100 CSU students have worked at CERN so far and the student came from 14 CSU campuses (Fresno, Channel Islands, Chico, East Bay, Humboldt, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Northridge, Pomona, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, Sonoma, and Stanislaus.
The Fresno State ATLAS program has been supported by 8 grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF): $802,034 from NSF's Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) (Award number: 2345092, from 4/1/2024 to 3/31/2027), $300,000 from NSF's International Research Experience for Students (IRES) (Award number: 1854214, from 3/15/2019 to 2/29/2024), $509,994 from NSF's Elementary Particle Physics (EPP) (Award number: 1505840, from 8/1/2015 to 7/31/2019), $50,000 from NSF's Elementary Particle Physics (EPP) (Award number: 1848453, from 8/1/2018 to 7/31/2019), $249,863 from NSF's International Research Experience for Students (IRES) (Award number: 1459240, from 8/1/2015 to 7/31/2019), $510,999 from NSF's Elementary Particle Physics (EPP) (Award number: 1206123, from 6/1/2012 to 5/31/2015), $620,000 from NSF's Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) (Award number: 0959141, from 3/1/2010 to 2/29/2012), and $460,000 from NSF's Elementary Particle Physics (EPP) (Award number: 0853728, from 8/15/2009 to 7/31/2012). In addition, we have received strong support from the Provost, College of Science and Mathematics (CSM), Office of Research and Sponsored Programs (ORSP), Department of Physics, Instructionally Related Activities (IRA) from Associated Students Inc. (ASI), Faculty Sponsored Student Research (FSSR), etc. of Fresno State. The $249,863 NSF IRES grant from 8/1/2015 to 7/31/2019 has supported a total of 15 students from CSU NUPAC campuses to work at CERN on ATLAS research for 3 summers from 2016 to 2018 (5 students each summer). The students spent full 8 weeks at CERN working on ATLAS research projects. In addition, they spent another 10 days or so visiting Europe after their work at CERN and before they return to the US. The $300,000 NSF IRES grant from 3/15/2019 to 2/29/2024 has supported a total of 18 students from CSU NUPAC campuses to work at CERN on ATLAS research for 3 summers from 2021 to 2023 (6 students each summer).
The new $802,034 NSF HSI) grant from 4/1/2024 to 3/31/2027 will support a total of 48 students (16 student per summer) from CSU NUPAC campuses and 3 community colleges (Madera Community College, Modesto Junior College, Santa Rosa Junior College) to work on ATLAS experiment at CERN or in the US with US ATLAS groups from US National Labs and universities. A poster about the new NSF HSI award and the ATLAS program can be found here.

 

Current and past research work by our ATLAS faculty, postdocs and other group members:

  • Build the first US ATLAS Shared Tier 3 Computing Facility on Cloud with $250,000 Amazon Web Service (AWS) credits award from the CSU Chancellor's Office (2019 to present by Dr. Bawa and Prof. Gao): Talks at US ATLAS Computing Working Group meetings

  • Develop new jet substructure and superstructure variables, including color-connection variables for new physic searches (2010 to 2012 by Dr. Lowe and Prof. Gao): Talks at the ATLAS Standard Model, Higgs and Exotics Working Groups from 2011 to 2012.

  • New physics searches with dijets in final state from ATLAS data (2010 to present by Dr. Bawa and Prof. Gao): Talks at the ATLAS Jet and Exotics Working Groups since 2010. Published at New J. Physics 13 053044 (2011), and JHEP 01 (2013) 029

  • ATLAS Inner Detector, Muon Detector, and Trigger Upgrade R&D Projects (2009 to present by CSU Students and Prof. Gao): Talks at ATLAS Inner Detector, Muon Detector, Trigger working group meetings since 2009.

  • Support ATLAS Event Data Model (EDM) in the trigger (2011 to 2012 by Dr. Lowe): Talks at the ATLAS Trigger Core Software working group meetings since 2011.

  • Liaison for JetEtMiss and Physics Analysis Tools (PAT) working groups (2010 to present by Dr. Bawa): Talks at the ATLAS Jet/Etmiss working group meetings since 2011.

  • Build up the first cloud-based Tier 3 computing cluster for US ATLAS (2011 to 2013 by Prof. Lin with CS faculty and Ph.D students from Chinese research universities)

  • W/Z and egamma work (2009 to 2010 by Dr. Bawa, Prof. Gao and graduate student Brent Wilson): Talks at North America e/gamma working group meetings.

  • Set up and run the CSU Fresno ATLAS Tier 3 cluster for ATLAS physics (2011 to present). The cluster was funded by NSF MRI grant. Dr. Sergey Uzunyan from Northern Illinois Univesity (NIU) provided essential help in system design, setting up and maintaining the cluster. The CSU Fresno ATLAS Tier 3 cluster has been running and heavily used for ATLAS physics by our group members. The cluster is currently maintained by Jay Fowler and Choa-Lin Chou of CSU Fresno ITS department.

  • ATLAS performance studies, Particle identification (PID) fake rates using reflections of known physics processes from incoming real ATLAS data and their impacts on ATLAS physics (2006 to 2008 by Prof. Gao): Talks at the ATLAS Standard Model, Higgs, Exotics, Electron/Photon, Jet/EtMiss, and Tau Working Groups from 2006 to 2008.

  • Significance calculation and a new analysis method in searching for new physics at the LHC (2005 to 2006 by Prof. Gao): Talks at the ATLAS Higgs Working Group in 2005 and 2007. Published in European Physical Journal C45, 659 (2006).

  • Electron/Pion Separation with LAr Barrel Module P15 using 2002 Testbeam Data (2002 to 2003 by Prof. Gao): ATLAS Note: ATL-LARG-2003-013, published in Nucl. Instrum. Meth. A550, 96 (2005)