VISPA news

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.