- Seminars-iihe - listserv.vub.be

IIHE Invited seminar: Latest results from DESI and their implication in cosmology
by TOSCANO Simona 05 Mar '26

05 Mar '26

Dear all, This week we have the pleasure of hosting Prof. Héctor Gil Marín from the University of Barcelona, who will present the latest results from the DESI experiment. The seminar will take place in the J. Sacton Room this Friday, March 6th, at 2:00 PM. Please find further details below: **************************************** Title: Latest results from DESI and their implication in cosmology Abstract: The Dark Energy Spectroscopy Instrument (DESI) has undertaken the largest spectroscopic survey to date. I will briefly describe the instrument and present the recently released results in terms of the Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) and Full-Shape analyses. Thanks to these studies, we have been able to measure the expansion history of the universe with unprecedented precision, test the theory of gravity at cosmological scales, and set an upper limit on the sum of the effective masses of neutrinos. When combining with other datasets such as the CMB or SNe samples, interesting findings point towards the possibility of the existence of a type of Dark Energy that would evolve with time. Short Bio: * PhD at the University of Barcelona, 2012 * Postdoc Position at the Institute of Gravitation and Cosmology (ICG) at the University of Portsmouth UK, 2012-2015 * Largrange Fellow at the LPNHE, Paris, 2015-2018 * Junior Leader `la Caixa' Fellow at the Institut de Ciencies del Cosmos (ICC) at the University of Barcelona, 2018-2023 * Junior Faculty Ramon-y-Cajal Fellow at the University of Barcelona, 2023-2025 * Professor at the University of Barcelona 2025-Present * Former member of BOSS and eBOSS collaborations, and currently a member and builder of DESI. **************************************** <https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2458/> [indico_square.png] IIHE Invited seminar: Latest results from DESI and their implication in cosmology<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2458/> indico.iihe.ac.be<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2458/> We will try again and an online connection will be available for those who are unable to attend in person; however, in-person attendance is strongly encouraged. Topic: Invited seminar - Héctor Gil Marín Time: Mar 6, 2026 02:00 PM Brussels Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82850532563?pwd=DEaheauQVTJCZcA6VIWrWrMj0Es68u.1 Meeting ID: 828 5053 2563 Passcode: 700313 Join instructions https://us02web.zoom.us/meetings/82850532563/invitations?signature=EcKeafkz… We very much look forward to a well-attended seminar and to seeing many of you on Friday! Simona. Dr. Simona Toscano (she / her / hers) Université Libre de Bruxelles Inter-university Institute for High Energies (IIHE) Service de physique de particules élémentaires, ULB - CP 230 Boulevard du Triomphe - 1050 Bruxelles (Belgium) Office : G.0.16 tel: +32.(0)2.629.3216 Email: stoscano(a)ulb.be<mailto:stoscano@vub.ac.be> or toscano(a)icecube.wisc.edu<mailto:toscano@icecube.wisc.edu> [PastedGraphic-10.png]

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Invited seminar: Understanding the interaction between hadrons: latest news from ALICE
by Simona Toscano 16 Jan '26

16 Jan '26

Dear all, First of all Happy New Year! We are pleased to resume our seminar series so early this year. For the first seminar of 2026, we have the pleasure of hosting Prof. Stefania Bufalino from the University of Torino, who will present the latest results from the ALICE experiment. The seminar will take place in the J. Sacton Room this Friday, January 16, at 2:00 PM. Please find further details below: ******** Title: Understanding the interaction between hadrons: latest news from ALICE Abstract: The ALICE experiment (A Large Ion Collider Experiment), installed at the CERN LHC, is devoted to the study of strongly interacting matter under extreme conditions of temperature and energy density. By exploiting ultra-relativistic heavy-ion collisions, ALICE investigates the properties of the quark– gluon plasma, a deconfined state of quarks and gluons. Thanks to a detector system optimized for excellent particle identification and precise vertex reconstruction, ALICE provides key measurements to deepen our understanding of QCD in the non- perturbative regime. In this seminar, particular emphasis will be given to the latest ALICE measurements of matter and antimatter production, which offer unique insights into hadronization mechanisms and fundamental symmetries in high-energy nuclear collisions. Light antinuclei can be produced in space either by collisions of high-energy cosmic rays with the interstellar medium or from the annihilation of dark matter particles stemming into standard model particles. High-energy hadronic collisions at accelerators create a suitable environment for producing light (anti)nuclei. Recent measurements of the production of antinuclei in different colliding system and of the cross- section of nuclei-antinuclei annihilation will be discussed. Such information is essential to study the different sources of antinuclei in our Universe and to interpret any future measurement of antinuclei in space. Short bio: Stefania Bufalino is Full Professor at the Department of Applied Science and Technology (DISAT) of Politecnico di Torino. She has extensive experience in experimental high-energy nuclear physics and has been actively involved in the ALICE experiment at CERN since its early phases. Her activity encompasses both physics analysis and detector hardware development, with a focus on particle identification detectors. She currently serves as deputy Project Leader of the Time-Of-Flight (TOF) detector for the ALICE 3 experimental proposal, a next-generation heavy-ion experiment at the LHC planned for the high-luminosity era. Her research focuses on heavy-ion collisions, particularly the production of matter and antimatter and hadronization processes under extreme conditions. ********* https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2437/ IIHE Invited Seminar: Understanding the interaction between hadrons: latest news from ALICE indico.iihe.ac.be We very much look forward to a well-attended seminar and to seeing many of you on Friday! Simona and Steven. Dr. Simona Toscano (she / her / hers) Université Libre de Bruxelles Inter-university Institute for High Energies (IIHE) Service de physique de particules élémentaires, ULB - CP 230 Boulevard du Triomphe - 1050 Bruxelles (Belgium) Office : G.0.16 tel: +32.(0)2.629.3216 Email: stoscano(a)ulb.be <mailto:stoscano@vub.ac.be> or toscano(a)icecube.wisc.edu <mailto:toscano@icecube.wisc.edu>

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Invited seminar: Searching for light dark matter and dark sectors with the NA64 experiment (Isabelle De Bruyn) - Friday Dec 5, 2pm in Sacton room
by Steven Lowette 01 Dec '25

01 Dec '25

Dear all, This Friday we will have a seminar from our in-house Isabelle De Bruyn: "Searching for light dark matter and dark sectors with the NA64 experiment" at 14h00 in the Sacton seminar room (G.1.03). The event's agenda can be found here: https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2334/ Please mark your agendas and see you Friday, Kind regards, Steven. -- Steven Lowette https://cern.ch/lowette/

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IIHE Invited seminar: Transient neutrino sources as probes of Beyond Standard Model Physics - November 14 at 2PM
by TOSCANO Simona 14 Nov '25

14 Nov '25

Dear all, Dr. Jose Carpio, from University of Nevada, is our invited speaker for the upcoming seminar. He will talk about "Transient neutrino sources as probes of Beyond Standard Model Physics”. The seminar will take place in the J. Sacton Room this Friday, November 14, at 2:00 PM. Please find the information below. Hope to see most of you there. Best, Steven and Simona <https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2332/> [indico_square.png] IIHE Invited seminar: Transient neutrino sources as probes of Beyond Standard Model Physics<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2332/> indico.iihe.ac.be<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2332/>

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Fwd: Invited seminar: Imaging with muons - Friday Oct 24, 2pm in Sacton room
by TOSCANO Simona 24 Oct '25

24 Oct '25

Hi all, just a reminder of the seminar starting in 5 minutes. See you all there. Simona. Begin forwarded message: From: TOSCANO Simona <Simona.Toscano(a)ulb.be> Subject: Fwd: [Seminars-iihe] Invited seminar: Imaging with muons - Friday Oct 24, 2pm in Sacton room Date: 22 October 2025 at 17:52:25 CEST To: allusers-iihe <allusers-iihe(a)listserv.vub.ac.be> Dear all, Since I understood that some of you are not in the seminar list (please contact Steven to be added), here’s the announcement for the seminar this Friday. Best, Simona Begin forwarded message: From: Steven Lowette via Seminars-iihe <seminars-iihe(a)listserv.vub.be> Date: 15 October 2025 at 13:57:01 CEST To: seminars-iihe(a)listserv.vub.be Subject: [Seminars-iihe] Invited seminar: Imaging with muons - Friday Oct 24, 2pm in Sacton room Reply-To: Steven Lowette <steven.lowette(a)cern.ch> Dear all, Please mark your agendas: on Friday Oct 24 we will have an IIHE seminar from our nearby colleague Andrea Giammanco: "Imaging with muons" at 14h00 in the Sacton seminar room (G.1.03). The event's agenda can be found here: https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2331/ Kind regards, Steven. -- Steven Lowette https://cern.ch/lowette/ _______________________________________________ Seminars-iihe mailing list -- seminars-iihe(a)listserv.vub.be To unsubscribe send an email to seminars-iihe-leave(a)listserv.vub.be

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Invited seminar: Imaging with muons - Friday Oct 24, 2pm in Sacton room
by Steven Lowette 15 Oct '25

15 Oct '25

Dear all, Please mark your agendas: on Friday Oct 24 we will have an IIHE seminar from our nearby colleague Andrea Giammanco: "Imaging with muons" at 14h00 in the Sacton seminar room (G.1.03). The event's agenda can be found here: https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2331/ Kind regards, Steven. -- Steven Lowette https://cern.ch/lowette/

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Invited seminar: Tuning into tau Neutrinos - Friday Sep 5, 2pm in J. Sacton
by Simona Toscano 05 Sep '25

05 Sep '25

Dear all, Our RNO-G colleague, Stephanie Wissel, Director of the Center for Multimessenger Astrophysics at the Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos at PSU, will be visiting us at the beginning of September. She has kindly agreed to give a seminar, as part of our invited seminar series, on her latest project related to the radio detection of astrophysical tau neutrinos. The seminar will be held on Friday, September 5, at 2:00 PM in the J. Sacton Room. Please find the information below. Hope to see most of you there. Best, Simona. Title: Tuning into Tau Neutrinos Abstract: Neutrinos are the ideal messenger for high-energy astrophysics. Weakly interacting and uncharged, they propagate undeterred and unabsorbed through the universe. In the last decade, the IceCube experiment has brought us the discovery of a flux of high-energy, TeV-scale neutrinos and through a multi-messenger lens — the combined observations of neutrinos and other messengers like photons — we are starting to see hints of energetic neutrino sources for the first time. At higher energies still, beyond the PeV scale, we can probe the most energetic sources of both neutrinos and cosmic rays, but current neutrino experiments become too small to observe a sizable flux. Radio experiments can achieve the large exposures necessary by taking advantage of the coherent broadband radio emission resulting from ultra-high-energy (E>10^17 eV) neutrino interactions as well as the large volumes visible from high elevations. In this talk, I will review results from current and future high-elevation radio experiments, with a particular focus on Earth-skimming tau neutrinos and cosmic ray air showers as observed with from mountains with BEACON and HERON. Short-bio: Stephanie Wissel’s work centers on multi-messenger astrophysics, with a particular emphasis on ultra-high energy neutrinos. Neutrinos play a key role in this growing field that combines observations from neutrinos, photons, cosmic rays, and gravitational waves to understand particle accelerators and the extreme physics that drives them. She has been working in astroparticle radio detection since 2012. She currently works on ARA, BEACON, PUEO, RNO-G, and IceCube-Gen2. She has been recognized for her work with an NSF CAREER Award as the PI on the BEACON experiment and with a Downsbrough Early Career Development Professorship in Physics https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2388/ IIHE Invited seminar: Tuning into Tau Neutrinos indico.iihe.ac.be Dr. Simona Toscano (she / her / hers) Université Libre de Bruxelles Inter-university Institute for High Energies (IIHE) Service de physique de particules élémentaires, ULB - CP 230 Boulevard du Triomphe - 1050 Bruxelles (Belgium) Office : G.0.16 tel: +32.(0)2.629.3216 Email: stoscano(a)ulb.be <mailto:stoscano@vub.ac.be> or toscano(a)icecube.wisc.edu <mailto:toscano@icecube.wisc.edu>

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Invited seminar: Probing the Dark Sector One Electron at a Time: Skipper CCDs and the DAMIC-M Experiment - Friday June 20th at 2 PM
by TOSCANO Simona 17 Jun '25

17 Jun '25

Dear all, As part of our invited seminar series, we are pleased to host a talk by Xavier Bertou from IJCLab in Paris-Saclay University, on Friday, June 20 at 2PM in the J. Sacton Room. This is going to be the last seminar for this academic year. We will resume in October. Please find here the info: Title: Probing the Dark Sector One Electron at a Time: Skipper CCDs and the DAMIC-M Experiment Abstract: Detecting dark matter—particularly in the light mass regime—requires sensitivity to extremely faint ionization signals, potentially down to a single electron. Skipper CCDs are a new class of silicon detectors that enable this level of sensitivity by achieving sub-electron noise, thanks to their ability to perform multiple non-destructive charge measurements per pixel. In this talk, I will introduce the operating principles and technological advances behind Skipper CCDs, contrasting them with conventional CCDs. I will then present how these sensors are used in the DAMIC-M experiment, a direct dark matter search operating at the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane, and show recent results from its prototype phase. These results set world-leading constraints on dark matter–electron scattering for sub-MeV dark matter, probing both freeze-out and freeze-in production mechanisms in the dark sector for the first time. Finally, I will highlight why Skipper CCDs are not just a niche detector but a transformative technology: from their applications in low-background rare-event searches to their potential to replace standard CCDs in broader scientific contexts, especially with new developments like MAS-CCDs enabling fast, multiplexed readout. Skipper CCDs are poised to reshape the landscape of precision low-energy detection. Short-bio: Xavier Bertou is Research Director at IJCLab (CNRS/IN2P3, Université Paris-Saclay), where he leads the Direct Dark Matter group within the Astrophysics, Astroparticle and Cosmology department. A specialist in experimental astroparticle physics, he has contributed extensively to major international efforts in cosmic ray and dark matter research. After completing his PhD at LPNHE in Paris and a Grainger Fellowship at the University of Chicago, he spent over two decades at Centro Atómico Bariloche in Argentina (CNEA/CONICET). There, he played a central role in the Pierre Auger Observatory, leading key aspects of the design, deployment, and operation of the surface detector array. He later spearheaded the development of novel detection technologies and underground science initiatives. Dr. Bertou is a long-standing member of the DAMIC-M Collaboration, where he co-leads the Central Data Acquisition System, and is actively involved in advancing Skipper CCD technology for low-threshold dark matter searches <https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2320/> [indico_square.png] IIHE Invited seminar: Probing the Dark Sector One Electron at a Time: Skipper CCDs and the DAMIC-M Experiment<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2320/> indico.iihe.ac.be<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2320/> Hope to see you all on Friday! Best, Simona.

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Invited seminar: Multimessenger astronomy with ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and high-energy neutrinos - Friday June 13th at 2PM
by TOSCANO Simona 13 Jun '25

13 Jun '25

Dear all, As part of our invited seminar series, we are pleased to host a talk on multimessenger astronomy by Foteini Oikonomou, Associate Professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, on Friday, June 13 at 2PM in the J. Sacton Room. Title: Multimessenger astronomy with ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and high-energy neutrinos Abstract: Multimessenger astrophysics has advanced rapidly over the past decade, driven in large part by new observations of high-energy neutrinos and gravitational waves. At the same time, ultra-high-energy cosmic ray experiments have made significant progress, including the discovery of a dipole anisotropy in UHECR arrival directions - a milestone that has revitalised the field of ultra-high-energy cosmic-ray astronomy. In this talk, I will review recent results in the search for the origins of high-energy neutrinos and ultra-high-energy cosmic rays. In particular, I will highlight a promising new site of ultra-high energy cosmic ray acceleration in active galactic nuclei (AGN): the wide-angle relativistic winds known as ultra-fast outflows. See you all on Friday. Best, Simona. <https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2299/> [indico_square.png] IIHE Invited seminar: Multimessenger astronomy with ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and high-energy neutrinos<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2299/> indico.iihe.ac.be<https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2299/>

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Invited seminars in June - save de dates
by TOSCANO Simona 19 May '25

19 May '25

Dear all, please find here the next round of invited seminars for the month of June: - 13 of June: "Multimessenger astronomy with ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and high-energy neutrinos” by Foteini Oikonomou (NTNU) - https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2299/ - 20 of June: "Probing the Dark Sector One Electron at a Time: Skipper CCDs and the DAMIC-M Experiment” by Xavier Bertou (IJCLab) - https://indico.iihe.ac.be/event/2320/ Save the dates in your agenda! Best, Simona.

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