VISPA news

Mark Hartz, TRIUMF and UVic Adjunct, has been recognized as a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and was selected by the Division of Particles and Fields. The APS Fellowship Program celebrates researchers who have made exceptional impact in the international physics community. It recognizes members who push the field forward through groundbreaking research, innovative real-world technologies, teaching, or outstanding leadership. The peer-led recognition is highly selective, with just 0.5% of the society’s non-student membership elected to the rank of Fellow each year.

On November 17-19, 2025, a multi-institutional project resulted in the successful transfer of over a terabit/second (Tbps) of data across the continent, from the University of Victoria in British Columbia, Canada, to the international Supercomputing Conference (SC25) in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. Reaching peak speeds of 1.15 Tbps, this demonstration was made possible through the participation of research computing groups at the University of Victoria (UVic) and Simon Fraser University (SFU), brought together by BCNET and CANARIE. This high-speed data transfer showcases what can be accomplished through the collaborative strength of national, provincial, and international network infrastructure partners.

University of Victoria (UVic) physicist Dominique Trischuk studies some of the tiniest pieces of the universe, particles so small they’re invisible to even the most powerful microscopes. But while her focus is on the minuscule, her questions, and the tools she’s using to answer them, are anything but small.

To support the Canadian contingent of ATLAS, principal investigator Robert McPherson will receive $18.8 million over three years from the NSERC Subatomic Physics funding program, federal industry minister Mélanie Joly announced today at TRIUMF in Vancouver. The new funding ensures that Canada, and UVic, will continue to contribute to breakthrough science.

The excavation of the colossal underground cavern that will house Hyper-Kamiokande, a next-generation neutrino detector in Japan was completed on July 31, 2025. The project, involving over 630 researchers from 22 countries including Canada, aims to investigate neutrino properties, search for proton decay, and test Grand Unified Theories with operations expected to start in 2028. Leading the Canadian team are VISPA members, Hartz, Karlen, and Konaka.

Scientists from the University of Victoria are among global researchers honoured with the 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics for their work with the ATLAS Collaboration at CERN, an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world—the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

Mark Hartz and Dean Karlen receive a second round of CFI funding ($6.3M) for constructing and installing precision calibration systems in the Hyper-K particle detector under construction near Kamioka, Japan and to ensure the accuracy of the measurements performed by the Hyper-K instruments.

The Higgs boson, ten years after its discovery

Successful laser cooling of antihydrogen by the ALPHA collaboration.