The nature of the neutrino has been a question puzzling physicists since its discovery. Many experiments are trying to solve this problem by searching for neutrino-less double beta decay. Two such projects that I work on are SNO+ and nEXO; using different technologies and different target isotopes to achieve similar scientific goals. I will compare and contrast these experiments, their...
Hyper-Kamiokande is the proposed next generation Water Cherenkov neutrino detector in Kamioka, Japan that began construction in 2020. Hyper-K will have an order of magnitude larger fiducial mass than the existing Super-Kamiokande detector, enabling the survey of topics in neutrino physics with improved sensitivity. One handle on detecting neutrino versus anti-neutrino interactions is to detect...
The Super-Kamiokande detector is a 40m tall cylindrical tank with a 40m diameter, filled with ultra-pure water. It makes detailed measurements of solar, atmospheric, and accelerator neutrinos. About 11,000 PMTs (photomultiplier tubes) facing inwards are set up on the detector wall to record neutrino interaction events. The use of the accurate location of photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) on the...
Super-Kamiokande is a neutrino detector in Japan containing 11,000 photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) surrounding a massive tank filled with 50 ktonne of ultra-pure water. The single-photon sensitive PMTs detect Cherenkov radiation produced by charged particles travelling faster than the speed of light in water. A detailed understanding of the PMTs, as well as their response to environmental...
We propose to improve light-shining-through-wall setup by employing macro coherent super radiance on the detection side. Parahydrogen molecules are pumped to their first excited states by counter-propagating laser beams. The background dark photon field will interact with the parahydrogen and trigger the collective deexcitation of the atomic system, resulting in a nonlinear amplification of...
Longstanding evidence from observational astronomy indicates that non-luminous "dark matter" constitutes the majority of all matter in the universe, yet this mysterious form of matter continues to elude experimental detection. The study presented in this talk is part of an ongoing programme to search for dark matter production in high-energy proton-proton collisions at the Large Hadron...
Some string theories predict that the extra dimensions of space must be large. In this scenario the energy scale of strings is on the order of TeV and string resonances can be produced in proton-proton collisions. This makes the theory a good candidate for investigation at the Large Hadron Collider. Using the cross sections of string resonances we can simulate particle interactions and compare...
Thermal field theory is the extension of quantum field theory to a non-zero temperature environment and is achieved by modifying the propagators in loop integrations represented by Feynman diagrams. The program package pySecDec is designed to numerically calculate dimensionally-regularized loop integrals in quantum field theory using the sector decomposition approach. It is shown how pySecDec...
Low-energy precision tests of electro-weak physics keep playing an essential role in the search for new physics beyond the Standard Model. Atomic parity violation (APV) measures the strength of highly forbidden atomic transitions induced by the parity violating (PV) exchange of Z bosons between electrons and quarks in heavy atoms. APV is sensitive to additional interactions such as...
The TUCAN collaboration is developing a dense source of Ultracold neutrons (UCN) that will be used in a neutron Electric Dipole Moment (nEDM) experiment, with a goal sensitivity of 10$^{(-27)}$ e*cm which is 10 times more precise than the best measurement to date. UCNs are neutrons with energies below 300 neV, that are travelling with speeds less than 30 km/h. In order to carry out a...
The Earth has been bombarded by high-energy particles for millions of years. Known as cosmic rays, these particles can have higher energies than particles accelerated by the best human-made accelerators. We have studied these energetic particles for over a hundred years. However, the sources of these particles remain a mystery because of the deflection of their trajectories by magnetic fields...
Neutron stars serve as excellent next-generation thermal detectors of dark matter, heated by the scattering and annihilation of dark matter falling into them. However, the composition and dynamics of neutron star cores are uncertain, making it difficult at present to unequivocally compute dark matter scattering in this region. On the other hand, the crust of a neutron star is more robustly...
The purpose of this presentation is to recognize the effects of electromagnetic energy injection into the early Universe from decaying sub-GeV dark vectors. Decay widths and energy spectra for the most prominent channels in the sub-GeV region are calculated for various dark vector models. The models include the kinetic mixing of the dark photon with the Standard Model photon, $U(1)_{A'}$ , a...
The Pacific Ocean Neutrino Explorer (P-ONE) is a planned large-scale Cherenkov neutrino detector to be deployed in Cascadia Basin, close to Vancouver Island. This detector will join a worldwide network of neutrino telescopes and holds exciting possibilities of bringing us a step closer to true neutrino astronomy as well as unravelling new physics. High energy tau neutrinos, above energies of...
Study of nuclear structure around the magic numbers is key to understanding the chart of nuclei. The region around $^{78}$Ni is of interest, not only because it is one of the heavier doubly magic nuclei, but also because it has been proposed as a portal to the fifth island of inversion [Nowacki, F. et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 272501]. Evidence for low-lying shape coexistence near N=40 has...
Reflection-asymmetric nuclei are of considerable interest for the understanding of nuclear structure. Reflection asymmetry arises as a consequence of strong octupole correlations which occur when states with $\Delta$j=$\Delta$l=3$\hbar$ lie close to the Fermi surface for both neutrons and protons. Octupole correlations are largest in the region with octupole magic numbers Z=88 and N=134. The...
The next Enriched Xenon Observatory (nEXO) is a planned ton-scale experiment to search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0$\nu{\beta \beta}$) in xenon-136. The sensitivity of nEXO is limited by the natural occurrence of radioactive background events which produce signals indistinguishable from 0$\nu \beta \beta$ in nEXO's detector. Barium tagging is a planned future upgrade of nEXO to reject...
In any finite system, the presence of a non-zero permanent electric dipole moment (EDM) would require both parity (P) and time-reversal (T) violation. The standard model predicts a very small CP violation and consequently any observation of the EDM would imply physics beyond the standard model. Thus, EDMs have long been proposed as a way to test these fundamental symmetries. Experimental...
As experiments searching for neutrinoless double beta decay ($0\nu\beta\beta$) are about to a reach ton-scale era, an effective way of calculating the nuclear matrix elements (NMEs), which govern the rate of the decay, is imperative. Observation of this decay would show the Majorana nature of neutrinos as well as potentially giving the absolute mass of the neutrino, as long as the NMEs are...
The nuclear charge distribution and nuclear magnetic moment modify the Coulomb potential in atoms, resulting in shifts in the electronic levels. Thus, atomic spectroscopy provides a way to probe nuclear structure. These measurements, however, require precise calculations of isotope shift factors and hyperfine constants. The IMSRG is an ab-initio technique, successfully used in nuclei, that...
The synthesis of heavy elements via the r-process involves extremely neutron-rich nuclei. Compared to light nuclei, our understanding of the properties of heavy, neutron-rich nuclei is sparse. The next-generation radioactive ion beam facilities, like ARIEL (TRIUMF), FAIR (GSI), CARIBU(ANL) and FRIB will offer unique possibilities to probe such nuclei.
I will give an overview about our...
Bound-state beta-decay ($\beta_b$-decay) is an exotic $\beta^-$-decay mode where the electron is emitted directly into a bound orbital (often K/L) of the daughter nuclei. Hence, the decay mode is only accessible to highly charged ions with no electrons (HCIs). Thallium-205 is an interesting stable neutral ion, whilst being unstable to $\beta_b$-decay as a bare ion. This instability at high...
The precise studies of nuclear $\beta$ decays between I$^{\pi}$ = 0$^{+}$ isobaric analogue states provide stringent tests of electroweak interactions. Precision measurements of the ft values for superallowed $\beta$ Fermi emitters between isospin T = 1 states has provided by far, the most precise value of V$_{ud}$, the up-down element of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa (CKM) quark mixing...
Mass measurement facilities are extremely important in furthering our understanding of nuclear structure away from the valley of stability. TRIUMF’s Ion Trap for Atomic and Nuclear Science (TITAN) is among the world’s premier precision trapping facilities, with the newly added Multiple-Reflection Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometer (MR-ToF-MS) expanding its reach. The TITAN MR-ToF-MS was used in...
The study of neutron rich nuclei far from the valley of stability has become an increasingly important field of research within nuclear physics. One of the decay mechanisms that opens when the decay Q value becomes sufficiently large is that of beta-delayed neutron emission. This decay mode is important when studying the astrophysical r-process as it can have a direct effect on theoretical...
Recent theoretical investigation continues to suggest that dark matter could be either a supermassive or superlight particle. Discovering dark matter at these mass extremes requires radical new approaches. I will survey some fascinating developments, including dark matter that forms black holes in the sun and Earth, dark matter that would make old white dwarfs explode, supermassive dark matter...
Superfluid neutron matter is a key ingredient in the composition of neutron stars. The physics of the inner crust is largely dependent on that of its $S$-wave neutron superfluid which has an effect on pulsar glitches and the neutron star cooling. Moreover, with recent gravitational-wave observations of neutron star mergers, the need for an equation of state for the matter of these compact...
Axions which were originally proposed as a solution to the Strong CP problem have gained interest as a potential Dark Matter candidate. Axion Quark Nuggets (AQNs) are a new model for Dark Matter consisting of quark or anti-quark matter contained within an axion domain wall. AQNs can produce axions when they encounter time dependent perturbations (such as passing through the interior of the...
The existence of dark matter is ubiquitous in cosmological data and its distribution has been mapped across many galaxies. From these observations, it must be some type of particle beyond the Standard Model. Yet, numerous underground particle detectors on Earth have been thoroughly looking for dark matter without any success. The null results call for bigger and more sensitive detectors, but...
P-type point contact (PPC) high-purity germanium detectors have gained substantial interests in the search for neutrinoless double beta decay ($0\nu\beta\beta$) due to their background-rejection capabilities and excellent energy resolution. The drift time of charge carriers in the detector can be used in determining the position of an energy deposition and identifying sources of the...
The Light only Liquid Xenon (LoLX) experiment aims to investigate the emission of scintillation and Cherenkov light in liquid xenon for its applications in rare event searches in particle physics. LoLX consists of 24 quadruple Hamamatsu VUV4 Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) arranged in an octagonal prism. SiPMs are covered with two different kinds of optical filters used to separate...
The DarkSide Collaboration intends to build a new direct WIMP search detector DarkSide-20k (DS-20k), a dual-phase Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber (LAr TPC) with an active mass of 23 t. Located at the Gran Sasso Laboratory in Italy, the DS-20k LAr TPC will be enclosed inside a liquid scintillator neutron veto and submerged inside an external liquid scintillator bath which will act as a...
The small wheels of the end-caps of the ATLAS muon spectrometer must be replaced to improve the angular resolution of tracks for precision muon momentum reconstruction during Run-3. The New Small Wheel (NSW) will be covered with two detector technologies, one of which is small-strip thin gap chambers (sTGCs). Canada is responsible for one quarter of the required sTGCs: the electrode boards are...
Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) is the accepted theory of the strong force between quarks and gluons and in recent years many successful predictions have come out of perturbative QCD (pQCD). However, pQCD is restricted by the running coupling constant $\alpha_s$, so at lower energies a problem arises where the predictions of pQCD no longer apply. While QCD-based models attempt to understand this...
A major future initiative of the international nuclear physics community is the construction of the world's first electron-nucleus collider in the coming decade, with the flexibility to change the nuclear ion species as well as the beam energies. For electron-proton collisions, the Electron-Ion Collider (EIC) would be the world's first collider where both beams are polarised. Recently, the EIC...
The NEWS-G experiment uses a spherical proportional counter filled with gas in order to detect potential dark matter particles that can ionize the gas after a nuclear recoil. The detector works by attracting the free electrons towards the centre of the sphere where there is a high voltage anode inducing a radial electric field. Near the anode, the accelerated electrons then cause a Townsend...
At the Queen's University Reactor Materials Testing Laboratory (RMTL) we are developing a quasi-monoenergetic beam of intermediate-energy neutrons. These neutrons will be used to do scattering experiments on the nuclei of gas atoms in the NEWS-G dark matter detector to measure the so-called quenching factor. The quenching factor relates the energy measured from nuclear recoils (such as from...
Zinc-65 (Zn-65) is a radionuclide of interest in the fields of medicine and gamma-ray spectroscopy, within which its continued use as a tracer and common calibration source necessitates increasingly-precise nuclear decay data. A Zn-65 dataset was obtained as part of the KDK ("potassium decay") experiment, whose apparatus consists of an inner X-ray detector and an efficient outer detector, the...
The ongoing search for dark matter continues to evolve, and the quest to reach lower cross-sections is leading to new technologies. One of the newer proposals involves the use of a bubble chamber which employs noble elements (such as argon and xenon) as the active mass. Combining recent developments of bubble chambers with liquid noble gases allows additional scintillation and ionization data...
DEAP-3600 searches for dark matter via the coherent scattering of argon nuclei by dark matter particles as they traverse the detector. The detector is located at SNOLAB, and uses 255 photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) viewing ~3300 kg of liquid atmospheric argon (AAr) in a spherical acrylic vessel. The use of liquid argon as a target allows the powerful discrimination of nuclear recoils (NR)...
A new comprehensive algorithm is presented for acoustic analysis of the complete exposure of the PICO-60 dark matter detector. The PICO-60 detector is a bubble chamber filled with 52 kg of C$_3$F$_8$ operated at the SNOLAB underground laboratory. The bubble chamber experiments run by PICO have been some of the leading experiments in direct detection of spin-dependent WIMP-proton interactions;...
Every time researchers have pushed the energy boundary in particle physics we have found something new about our Universe. Recently, IceCube has demonstrated that Neutrino Telescopes can use neutrinos from the cosmos as excellent tools to continue this exploration. In this talk I will cover the latest searches for new physics using IceCube, as well as plans to deploy a new Neutrino Telescope...
In the search for astrophysical neutrinos, neutrino telescopes instrument large volumes of clear natural water. Photomultiplier tubes placed along mooring lines detect the Cherenkov light of secondary particles produced in neutrino interactions, and allow us to search for possible neutrino sources in the sky. The P-ONE experiment proposes a new neutrino telescope off the shore of British...
The neutrino, a fundemental particle, offers the potential to image parts of the universe never before seen and can provide an early warning for cosmic events. With their ability to carry information across the universe unperturbed, neutrinos offer a clear image of the cosmos and can provide insight into its nature with relative ease. Learning from successful neutrino telescopes such as...
Recent observations by neutrino observatories such as IceCube have thoroughly cemented the research potential of neutrino astronomy. The Pacific Ocean Neutrino Explorer (P-ONE) is a proposed initiative to construct one of the largest neutrino telescopes deep in the northern Pacific Ocean off the coast of British Columbia. The detector itself will consist of an array of strings lined with...
Since the discovery of the Higgs Boson at the LHC in 2012, no sign of new physics beyond the Standard Model has been found. The SUSY and exotic particles searches have not uncovered signs of new physics, as the model-dependent searches. In recent years, multiple unsupervised machine learning methods have been proposed to search for new physics at the LHC. This talk will explore the use of a...
A crucial task of the ATLAS calorimeter is energy measurement of detected particles. In the liquid argon (LAr) calorimeter subdetector of ATLAS, electromagnetically and hadronically interacting particles are detected through LAr ionization. Special electronics convert drifting electrons into a measurable current. The analytical technique presently used to extract energy from the measured...
Multiquark states have been of great interest among hadronic physicists, and despite the big breakthrough that came in 2003 with the discovery of the charmonium-like tetraquark candidate X(3872), their internal quark structure (e.g., molecular versus diquark clusters) is not well-understood yet. QCD sum-rule mass estimates for multiquark states can provide insights on possible internal quark...
It is known that the unique shape of the Higgs potential assumed in the Standard Model results in spontaneous symmetry breaking in physics at low energies, but the exact role of the Higgs in electroweak symmetry breaking (EWSB) has yet to be experimentally established. This gap in understanding also leaves the possibility that new physics phenomena could contribute to EWSB. One particularly...
The photo-production mechanism used in the GlueX experiment by impinging an 8.2-8.8 GeV linearly polarized photon beam on a liquid hydrogen target allows the mapping of light mesons in unprecedented detail with particular interest in exotic meson candidates. Polarization observables such as beam asymmetry $\Sigma$, extracted from azimuthal ($\phi$) angular distributions between the meson...
For the last few decades, High Energy Physics has been a victim of its own early success. Despite numerous theoretical arguments why it cannot be the final explanation for the interactions of fundamental particles, the Standard Model of particle physics continues to withstand intense scrutiny of the most determined experimental physicists. One promising way to search for signs of new physics...
The Large Hadron Collider located at CERN outside of Geneva, Switzerland uses proton-proton collisions to produce a wide range of particles. W and Z bosons, the mediators of the fundamental weak force, are some of the particles that can be produced in proton-proton collisions and can be used to give a more complete understanding of the Standard Model. One of the ways they can decay is into...
The ATLAS Experiment at CERN is a general-purpose particle physics detector that measures properties of particles created in high-energy proton-proton collisions fueled by CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Searching for undiscovered particles is exciting, but there is still much to be learned about the particles that we know to exist in the Standard Model by making precision measurements of...
W +jets is a curious playground of hard objects like jets, and electroweak interactions from the leptonic decay of the W boson. In this region of phase space, very interesting measurements are made to stringently test the Standard Model production mechanisms, as well as provide inputs to state-of-the-art parton distribution functions determination, for example with the W+/W− asymmetry...
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN has been colliding protons at an unprecedented centre of mass energy of $13~$TeV since 2015. ATLAS, a general-purpose particle detector located at one of the LHC's interaction points, has collected nearly $140~\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ of the resulting data, allowing scientists to perform some of the most stringent tests of the Standard Model (SM) of particle...
Moller experiment was designed to obtain ultra-precise measurement of weak mixing angle through Moller scattering. Moller Parity Violating Asymmetry (A_{PV}) measures the electroweak charge which at one loop level is modified and it becomes scale dependent at which the measurement is carried out. We calculated the tree level and one loop level Moller Parity Violating Asymmetry (A_{PV}) by...
