PhD studentship on ATLAS Electroweak SUSY searches (2021)

What you get

• Fully-paid tuition fees for three and a half years
  
• A tax-free bursary for living costs for three and a half years. From October 2021/22 this is expected to be £15560 per year
• A research training support grant for three and a half years of £1,250 per year.

Type of award

Postgraduate Research

PhD project

The Sussex ATLAS group is one of the leaders in the search for Beyond the Standard Model (BSM) physics in Electroweak Supersymmetry (SUSY) models. The successful applicant for this project will lead the search for SUSY in ATLAS data with specific emphasis on the production of SUSY particles via Vector Boson Fusion (VBF) and Initial State Radiation (ISR). These events are characterised by final states with two taus, one or two jets, and missing energy coming from the decay of the SUSY particles, and are expected to give competitive sensitivities for SUSY searches in Run-3 of the Large Hadron Collider (expected to start towards the end of 2021), as well as at the future High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC). The student will apply new data science techniques (ML, MVAs, etc) and/or identify new variables, as well as study possible new triggers for the analysis. In addition to the data analysis work, the student will take part in the ATLAS Detector operations through work on the ATLAS Trigger system. The Sussex group is leading the ATLAS Inner Detector (ID) trigger system, and the student will work on the development, testing and commissioning of ID trigger algorithms to efficiently select electron-, muon- and tau-triggered events at the start of (and during) Run3 of the ATLAS experiment

Eligibility

• Open to students from the UK, EU and Overseas.
• If you are not a UK national, nor an EU national with settled/pre-settled status in the UK, you may need to apply for a student study visa before admission.     
• hold or expect to hold a UK upper second-class degree (or non-UK equivalent) in Physics or a closely-related area, or else a lower second-class degree followed by a relevant Master's degree

We also welcome applications from independently-funded students interested in our experimental programme.

Deadline

30 March 2021 11:00

How to apply

Apply online at https://www.sussex.ac.uk/study/phd/apply/log-into-account

Select the PhD in Physics with a September 2021 start date.

State in the Finance & Funding section that you are applying for the STFC EPP studentship no. STFC/EPP/2020/05, “ATLAS Electroweak”

To be considered for more than one of our STFC EPP positions, include the studentship number(s) from our other advertisements in the Finance & Funding section.

Be sure to supply all of the required documents, particularly your transcripts and the details of two referees.

Due to the high volume of applications received, you may only hear from us if your application is successful.

Contact us

If you have practical questions about the progress of your applications or your eligibility, contact Emma Ransley at mps-pgrsupport@sussex.ac.uk

For academic questions contact [ the coordinator of STFC EPP PhD admissions, Dr. W. Clark Griffith: W.C.Griffith@sussex.ac.uk or the supervisor of this project, Professor Fabrizio Salvatore, P.F.Salvatore@sussex.ac.uk

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/epp/

Timetable

The position will be filled as soon as a suitable candidate is found so early application is advised. 

Interviews of shortlisted candidates will be held in February and March initially and will continue until the position is filled.