UCLA Dark Matter Advanced Training Institute

University Of California-Los Angeles, Los Angeles CA

Investigators

Abstract

This award will provide support for a three-day Advanced Training Institute (ATI) for about 30 junior researchers, all already engaged in dark matter research from diverse backgrounds and subfields. The Institute will take place on Feb 18-20, 2018, immediately preceding the well-established three-day international conference on "Sources and Detection of Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the Universe," which will take place on Feb. 21-23, 2018 on the UCLA campus. This conference is aligned with NSF interests in developing a diverse workforce. The organizers will pay particular attention to the diversity of the students and the lecturers, in particular to the participation of women and other under-represented groups. The UCLA ATI, devoted entirely to dark matter, would significantly enhance the opportunities in the US for junior researchers on the dark matter problem to get a high-level training on forefront research issues in different subfields from the experts in each of these subfields. The hunt for the dark matter is truly an interdisciplinary enterprise that involves laboratory experiments, astrophysical and cosmological observations combined with simulations of structure formation in the Universe, searches at accelerators, such as the LHC, and particle physics theory. The ATI will cover a variety of different subjects in these areas, highlighting the most interesting advances. This award will provide partial financial support to non-local junior researchers participating in the UCLA Dark Matter Advanced Training Institute.