Department of Energy announces $2.2 million for U.S.-Japan cooperative research in high energy physics

(Press-News.org) WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced $2.2 million for 11 collaborative research projects in high energy physics that involve substantial collaboration with Japanese investigators.

For over forty years, collaboration between U.S. and Japanese scientists has enabled progress in some of the most challenging areas in high energy physics. Working together, researchers explore the universe at the smallest and largest scales, from the most elementary constituents of matter and energy to the nature of space and time. The long history of U.S.-Japan cooperation includes many significant milestones, such as the contributions by Japanese collaborators on the Collider Detector at Fermilab experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider to the discovery of the top quark in 1995. High energy physics continues to play a major role in nurturing top scientific talent and building and sustaining the nation’s scientific workforce.

“Our office is proud of its track record of collaborating with scientists in Japan in improving our understanding of the universe,” said Regina Rameika, DOE Associate Director of Science for High Energy Physics (HEP). “We’re excited to continue this fruitful collaboration with our Japanese colleagues and enable discovery science that will also benefit society.”

Projects funded in this announcement will support current experiments and technology development of mutual interest to U.S.-Japan collaborations. Research topics include advancing the understanding of the Higgs boson, neutrinos, rare particles, and dark energy, as well as the development of particle accelerator and detector technology that will benefit future research in these areas.

The projects submitted to DOE were selected by competitive peer review under the DOE National Laboratory Announcement for the U.S.-Japan Science and Technology Cooperation Program in High Energy Physics. Each proposed U.S.-Japan collaboration had its Japanese Principal Investigator apply to a coordinated call by the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization (KEK) in Japan for support in the collaborative activity. Final selections were determined with strategic coordination between the DOE and KEK, with each providing funding to the successful U.S. and Japanese awards, respectively.

Total funding is $2.2 million for projects lasting up to three years in duration, with $1 million in outyear funding contingent on congressional appropriations. The list of projects and more information can be found on the HEP homepage. 

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