Particle detectors, as a technique, encompass the ensemble of methods and instrumentation used to register, localize, and characterize ionizing particles through their interactions with matter. These techniques exploit processes such as ionization, scintillation, Cherenkov radiation, and semiconductor charge collection to convert particle passage into measurable electrical or optical signals. Detector techniques include tracking (e.g., gaseous wire chambers, silicon strip and pixel detectors), calorimetry (sampling and homogeneous calorimeters for energy measurement), and time-of-flight methods for velocity determination, often integrated in complex, layered systems enabling precise reconstruction of particle trajectories, momenta, identities, and interaction vertices in nuclear, particle, and astroparticle physics experiments.
A team led by researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University, in collaboration with Tohoku University and Orbray Co., Ltd., using heteroepitaxial diamond materials developed by Orbray, have shown that lab-grown diamonds might ...
Optics & Photonics
May 11, 2026
0
10
Theories of quantum mechanics predict that some particles can exist in superpositions, which essentially means that they can be in more than one state at once. When a particle's state is measured, however, this superposition ...
Proton beams are not only used in sophisticated nuclear physics experiments. Today, they are becoming increasingly popular in radiotherapy, where they are an irreplaceable tool for destroying cancer cells. Doctors and physicists ...
General Physics
May 1, 2026
0
18
An international research team has achieved an important milestone for astrophysics at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt: In the CRYRING@ESR storage ring, scientists were able to measure nuclear reactions at extremely low energies for ...
General Physics
Apr 30, 2026
0
127
Particle accelerators such as those at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva are typically highly complex large-scale devices. In these ring-shaped facilities, which are often several kilometers ...
Plasma Physics
Apr 30, 2026
1
87
Some innovations in physics come from entirely new technologies, others from fresh theoretical insights. Others still take shape by bringing together existing tools in new ways, working out how to combine them to outperform ...
General Physics
Apr 24, 2026
0
449
One of the biggest open questions in particle physics today is how the Higgs boson interacts with itself. This "self-coupling" could help explain the evolution of the early universe and the mechanism that gives mass to elementary ...
General Physics
Apr 22, 2026
0
33
Tens of kilometers above Earth's surface, high-energy particles from outer space constantly strike the atmosphere, creating showers of energetic secondary particles that rain down from the sky. Approximately one of these ...
General Physics
Apr 21, 2026
0
14
According to our current understanding of the universe, quarks are fundamental, point-like particles: basic building blocks that are not made up of smaller particles. A recent paper from the CMS Collaboration describes how ...
General Physics
Apr 16, 2026
3
261
Dark matter is believed to make up a large fraction of the matter in the universe, yet its true nature remains unknown. Most past experiments have focused on heavier dark matter candidates, while much lighter dark matter, ...
Astronomy
Apr 14, 2026
5
61
