Roger Forty: New Deputy Head of the PH department

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Roger is British, and studied physics at Oxford University and then Imperial College London. His thesis was on a fixed-target experiment, studying the production of charmed particles with one of the first silicon micro-strip detectors. He came to CERN as a Fellow in 1990 to work on ALEPH at LEP, and then stayed on as a research staff member. He joined LHCb right at the birth of the collaboration and has served as deputy spokesperson twice, once in the design phase and over the last few years during its very successful first run. His research career has focused on flavour physics, with measurements of the lifetimes and particle-antiparticle oscillations of beauty hadrons, and also instrumentation: he optimised the design of the RICH detectors for LHCb, and has more recently been developing a novel concept for very fast time-of-flight measurement.

It is an interesting challenge to take the position of one of the deputy heads of the PH department, to take a broader view of the research being done at CERN, and to help facilitate the work of all the diverse groups in the department. LHCb is running well and has recently had its upgrade approved, so it will still be there when the current two year mandate has been completed. And Roger will try to keep an eye on the time-of-flight development, if time permits… He had previously helped Philippe Bloch with the review of non-LHC preprints, and will now take over from him the formidable task of reviewing the LHC preprints too. He sees his main role as working closely with Livio as department head, to support him in whatever way is needed, and to be available to stand in for him when required. He will focus in particular on participation in the scientific committees, recruitment of research staff, and support of the smaller experiments.

The immediate challenge for most of the experiments is to prepare for the next run, both of the LHC and at the PS/SPS, as the shutdown comes to its end later this year. For the LHC experiments the increase in energy and twice-higher bunch crossing rate will bring their own challenges. At the same time, their upgrades have to be prepared, and are reaching the stage of detailed implementation for the next decade, while for the details are still to be finalised for the longer term in conjunction with high-luminosity LHC. There is also the challenge of maintaining a diverse scientific programme at CERN, with the smaller experiments providing a vibrant environment to complement the LHC, and with the recent initiatives for neutrino experiment R&D that need to become more concrete. This needs to be balanced with design studies for the energy frontier machine that will follow the LHC at CERN, for both the linear and future circular colliders. There are also the CERN commitments to training, knowledge transfer and outreach. The department must navigate a way to support all this activity, while facing the severe limitations on staff levels, and also encourage a safe, diverse and positive working environment.