Located at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) near Geneva, Switzerland, LHCb focuses on understanding the properties and decays of these hadrons, which offer a unique window into the quark “flavour” sector of the Standard Model. LHCb measures the decay products of these hadrons—their momenta, charges, and particle types—with high precision. By comparing matter and antimatter decay rates and patterns, LHCb searches for asymmetries that could explain the observed matter-antimatter imbalance. Its forward spectrometer design optimizes the study of beauty and charm hadrons, which are predominantly produced at small angles relative to the LHC beam axis. This design incorporates specialized detectors, including the Vertex Locator (VELO) detector [built at the University of Liverpool, see image below] for precise decay point location, tracking detectors for reconstructing particle paths, and particle identification detectors for distinguishing particle types.
Liverpool's contributions to LHCb span the experiment's lifecycle, from the design, construction, and operation of detector systems (particularly the VELO) to data analysis. Liverpool researchers are heavily involved in analysing CP violation (matter-antimatter symmetry violation), charm(onia) physics, rare beauty decays, baryonic decays, tests of the Standard Model and searches for new phenomena beyond the Standard Model. Liverpool is also actively developing future detectors (e.g. Liverpool leads aspects of Mighty Tracker development) and systems required for the collection and analysis of data in upcoming LHCb Upgrades.
The group's research work on LHCb is strongly supported by the Science and Technology Research Council (STFC) and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).
Team Leader
- Prof Tara Shears
Academic, Research and Technical Staff
- Prof Themis Bowcock
- Mr Kieran Bridges
- Mr John Carroll
- Prof Gian Casse
- Mr Ashley Greenall
- Dr Karol Hennessy
- Dr David Hutchcroft
- Mrs Ayushi Khatri
- Dr Juan Leite
- Dr Paras Naik
- Dr Kurt Rinnert
- Dr Eduardo Rodrigues
- Dr Eva Vilella-Figueras
PhD Students
- Thomas Ackernley
- James Brown
- Abbie Chadwick
- Ned Howarth
- Ho Sang Lee
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