New Staff Members and Fellows
Roberto Acciarri
Hello! I’m Roberto, and I’ve recently joined the CERN EP-NU group as a staff physicist. I’m an experimental physicist with 10+ years of experience in the development, construction, and installation of liquid Argon TPC detectors for various neutrino and test beam experiments. My main contributions will focus on supporting the ongoing and future tests performed at the Neutrino Platform with the NP02 prototype of the DUNE experiment. Additionally, I will be running the liquid Argon R&D lab and overseeing the procurement of CERN deliverables for the HV system of the DUNE experiment.
Davide Casarotto
Hello! I’m Davide and I’m Italian. After my three years of fellowship as electrical technician in the TE-MPE Group, I recently joined the Gas Team in the EP-DT Group. My role for the following years will consist of assisting the team with the maintenance and operation of the gas systems, specifically the Atlas experiment, for which I will be responsible. Aside from this, I will also be in charge of electrical development and commissioning of the new systems, as well as the upgrades of existing ones.
Dimitrios Christidis
Dimitrios first joined the EP department in 2018. Since August 2025, he has taken up a Staff position, assuming two roles. The first is to lead all aspects of distributed data management for the ATLAS experiment, such as operations, infrastructure, and the preparation for HL-LHC. The second is to work on Rucio, the data management system used by ATLAS, CMS, and numerous other scientific communities, as a senior developer, providing direction in numerous areas of the project and engaging with the wider community. Dimitrios holds a diploma in Computer Engineering and Informatics from the University of Patras, Greece.
Chiara De Martin
I am an Italian physicist in the ALICE experiment at CERN. I did my University studies and my PhD at the University of Trieste, where I focused on the data analysis of strange hadron production in small collision systems. As a CERN Fellow in the ALICE group, I am analysing heavy-ion and light-ion collisions with the goal of increasing our understanding of the quark-gluon plasma properties.
Luis Mario Fraile
I am an experienced experimental nuclear physicist. I am delighted to have joined CERN as ISOLDE Physics Section Leader at the EP department. I also have the privilege of being the ISOLDE Collaboration spokesperson. In this dual role, I will oversee the implementation of the ISOLDE scientific programme and coordinate with the CERN management on issues involving radioactive ion beams and nuclear physics in general. I will liaise with CERN technical teams regarding everyday operations and the ISOLDE consolidation and upgrades. I will also work with the ISOLDE Collaboration Committee to promote projects to develop and expand the facility and its programme.
Gianluca Gilmore Kerr
Hello! My name is Gianluca Gilmore Kerr, and I am a mechanical engineer with specialisation in design and manufacture. I am a new graduate to the ranks of the EP department, assisting with the mechanical design and integration of new FCCee detector concepts. My background has predominantly been in automotive powertrain design, so high energy physics and their detectors have been a completely new and fascinating challenge for me so far. It’s been incredible to get involved, explore the sector, and I’m very excited to help turn theoretical concepts into real working detectors over the next few years!
Jose Javier Gonzalez Abascal
My name is Javier and I joined CERN last June as an Early-Career Professional. I will be contributing to the definition and development of the Data Acquisition systems for the future SHiP experiment (EP-SME-SHP): from the firmware of FPGAs used in the back end to the interfaces to connect to other systems. To achieve this, we will be reusing hardware already designed by other experiments, such as the FELIX cards for the ATLAS upgrades, and we will draw inspiration from the timing and control architectures used in LHCb.
Lewis Guy Hanson
Hello, my name is Lewis. I have recently joined the EP-DT group as a staff member, working as a Mechanical Technician in the Laboratory of Composites. My main area of expertise is precision manufacturing using CNC equipment. Before this position, I was a fellow in Beam Instrumentation, where I gained valuable experience with CERN’s accelerator complex and expanded my technical skill set. In my current role within EP-DT-CO, I will be contributing to the production of precision components, patterns, and moulds for composite manufacturing, as well as bespoke tooling and fixturing. In addition I will also be involved in design activities and precision assembly. This work will contribute to both CMS and ATALAS with focus on the TBPS Rings production and ITk Pixel Outer Barrel. I look forward to meeting and collaborating with many of you.
Zdenko Hives
I will be working within the EP-ESE-FE group under the supervision of Peter Lichard, focusing on detector systems for the NA62 experiment. My responsibilities include the operation and maintenance of the STRAW and Vetocounter detectors, as well as contributing to the development and testing of a new straw detector prototype. This work involves both technical support for ongoing data-taking and research activities aimed at improving detector performance and reliability. Through this role, I look forward to collaborating closely with colleagues in the group and contributing to the success of NA62.
Markus Holzer
Hello! I recently joined CERN as a research fellow, bringing a PhD background in high-performance heterogeneous computing. My fellowship focuses on enhancing core data structures within CMSSW. Specifically, as part of the NextGen Triggers project, I am developing Structure of Arrays (SoA)-based data layouts to enable efficient heterogeneous event reconstruction. Throughout my contract, I will work on optimizing GPU memory throughput, improving data transfer efficiency, and advancing real-time event processing.
Florian Jonas
Hello, I am Florian from Germany, and I just started as a research fellow in the EP department. I am a member of the ALICE collaboration and completed my PhD at the University of Muenster in Germany, followed by a postdoctoral position at UC Berkeley in the US. My time as a fellow will be primarily dedicated to studying the Quark-Gluon plasma using jets and electromagnetic probes with the ALICE experiment. However, I will also do some phenomenological work to explore how we can utilise prompt photons for QCD physics at the FCC-ee.
Miguel Navarro Baeza
After three years on the HL-LHC accelerator project, I am excited to have recently joined EP-DT, where I will contribute to the CMS Tracker Upgrade. My work will focus on the assembly and integration of the Tilted TBPS and its interfaces with neighbouring sub-detectors. In this capacity, I will support the installation coordination at the Tracker Integration Facility and later at CMS experimental cavern, while ensuring operations’ traceability and quality. I will also help keep procedures, schedules, and best practices accessible to all collaborators, to enable a smooth and efficient workflow in this key stage of the upgrade.
Mattia Soldani
Ciao! I’m Mattia, and I just joined the ATLAS calorimetry team at CERN as a Research Fellow. I design the hadronic calorimeter for the ALLEGRO experiment at the leptonic Future Circular Collider, from back-of-the-envelope calculations to the development of fully operational prototypes. At the same time, I work with the ATLAS operations crew to guarantee a smooth run for the Tile hadronic calorimeter. My long-term goal is to play a central role in defining how the particle detectors of tomorrow will look like.
Ahmed Tarek
I am Ahmed Tarek, a physicist from Egypt and CERN fellow with the ATLAS experiment and SND. Currently, I serve as ATLAS e/gamma convener, leading efforts on electron/photon efficiency measurements, energy calibration. I am contributing to transformer based energy regression algorithm. I also contribute to Higgs diphoton analyses, differential cross-section measurements, and CP violation constraints in HVV interactions. Within SND, my focus is on Run-4 upgrades and commissioning silicon-based detectors to replace emulsion detectors.
Steffie Ann Thayil
Hello, I’m Steffie! I joined the CERN ATLAS group in September as an applied physics research fellow. My work will focus on the High-Granularity Timing Detector (HGTD), an HL-LHC upgrade designed to provide precision timing for charged particles. In particular, I will contribute to the HGTD demonstrator, which in its final form will represent 1/32 of the full detector. For my PhD with CMS, I performed a search for BSM pseudoscalars and worked extensively on operations of the hadron calorimeter. I’m excited to bring this experience to ATLAS and begin this new chapter!
Sebastian Wuchterl
After two years as a Research Fellow at CERN, I am pleased to continue in the EP-CMG-OS group as a Staff member. My research in CMS focuses on measuring the Higgs boson’s interaction with charm quarks and performing precision studies of top quarks. I am also contributing to the Level-1 Trigger upgrade for the High-Luminosity LHC, working on particle reconstruction, pileup mitigation, and jet reconstruction. Looking ahead, I am exploring machine learning approaches to improve particle reconstruction and heavy-quark jet identification, aiming to enhance the precision of future CMS analyses.