The Breakthrough Prize Foundation in the United States has awarded a prize worth three million dollars (2.74 million euros) recognizing the work of over 13,000 scientists involved with the ATLAS, CMS, ALICE, and LHCb detectors at the world’s largest particle accelerator, the LHC, part of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).
The Laboratory of Instrumentation and Experimental Particle Physics (LIP) noted in a statement that Portuguese physicists have made significant contributions to the ATLAS and CMS experiments, participating in the design, construction, operation, and updating of essential detector components and actively engaging in data analyses.
The statement further highlighted that members of the LIP teams, representing Portugal scientifically at CERN, have held leadership positions in both experiments.
LIP emphasized that instruments like ATLAS and CMS have enabled the investigation of the fundamental constituents of matter and the forces governing the Universe, detailed measurements of the properties of the Higgs boson, an elementary particle, and searches for new physical phenomena.
The prize money will be allocated to fund scholarships for doctoral students, allowing them to spend up to two years at CERN to develop their theses.
The Breakthrough Prizes annually honor scientific advancements in Fundamental Physics, Life Sciences, and Mathematics.
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, the company behind social media platforms Facebook and Instagram and the WhatsApp app, is one of the awards’ founders.
In 2019, the Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics was awarded to the vast international team of scientists that captured the first image (shadow) of a black hole.
Portuguese astrophysicist Hugo Messias was part of that team.
