News

Talks are now online. Please see the programme page for details.

The group picture and the pictures of the CSF Award winners are available here.

New results from the Xenon100 direct dark matter search have been announced at DarkAttack in world premiere on Wednesday July 18th 9am CET by Elena Aprile. The talk is available here.

An article about the new XENON100 results was published in La Regione Ticino, it is available here.

Overview

For the past 80 years, astronomers have been wondering what exactly is responsible for the distribution of galaxies in the sky, and what drives the way they move about each other. Gravity as we know it, cannot explain this; not if visible matter is all there is to the Universe. Today, particle physics might be on the verge of finally unraveling this mystery.

Many physicists believe that the explanation for the behavior and structure of galaxies lies in the infinitely small scales of subatomic particle physics. A new type of particle, unlike any of the particles we know about, which does not emit nor absorb light, could be effectively invisible to the astronomers' instruments, yet make up most of the mass of the Universe. The detection of this new particle would shake up our understanding of the basics building blocks of the cosmos. The hunt for "Dark Matter" is on.

The Large Hadron Collider at CERN has begun testing some of the theories about Dark Matter. By colliding beams of particles at very high energy, this machine will re-create conditions that existed a fraction of a second after the Big Bang. Scientists believe that in this process Dark Matter particles will be produced. At the same time, other experiments (such as underground Dark Matter detector and satellites observing debris produced by Dark Matter collisions in the Universe) are being used to characterize the nature of Dark Matter, and to test whether its properties can explain the astronomers' puzzling observations.

This conference will bring together scientists looking for Dark Matter in particle physics, astrophysics and cosmology, in order to facilitate their collaboration and promote the exchange of new ideas across the different communities. This stimulating meeting will promote the development of a new, truly global approach to the discovery and characterization of Dark Matter, and help scientists to join forces in tackling one of the biggest unsolved mysteries of fundamental physics.

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of activity at the CSF, the director and the scientific board of the Centro Stefano Franscini have decided to establish a CSF Award for young scientists to be attributed to the best presentation during darkattack2012. The award will consist of a certificate and the sum of CHF 500.-, which will be awarded to the best oral presentation by a young scientist (a PhD student or someone with at most 3 years of postdoctoral experience and a maximum age of 33). The award will be presented on Thursday evening.

Participation is limited to approximately 50 attendees, which will be selected by the SOC to ensure a balanced scientific programme. The registration deadline for full consideration is March 31st 2012. Late registrations will be considered on a first come first served basis as long as places are still available. Priority will be given to participants who commit to take part for the whole period.

Registration is open on Sunday from 4 to 7 p.m. at the conference center. Every participant will get a welcome pack with all necessary information when registering. Participants arriving after 7 p.m. on Sunday will do the registration on Monday morning at 8 a.m.

Dinner on Sunday evening at 7 p.m. will be a served as buffet in "SALA LUCE". This assures that participants who will arrive later may still get warm food.

Check-in at Monte Verità starts only after 3 p.m. on Sunday (rooms cannot be taken before).

Welcome drink will be served at the terrace. In case of bad weather it will take place inside at the restaurant at 5 p.m. on Sunday.

>> List of participants

Invited Speakers

Elena Aprile (University of Columbia)
Roger Barlow (University of Manchester)
Oliver Buchmüller (Imperial College London)
Sascha Caron (University Nijmegen and NIKHEF)
Wyn Evans (University of Cambridge)
Enectali Figueroa-Feliciano (MIT)
Francis Halzen (University of Wisconsin)
Andrew Jaffe (Imperial College London)
Rocky Kolb (University of Chicago)
Konrad Kuijken (Leiden Observatory)
Andrea Valerio Maccio (MPIA Heidelberg)
Philipp Mertsch (University of Oxford)
Simona Murgia (SLAC)
Subir Sarkar (Oxford of University)
Nigel Smith (Snolab)
Louis Strigari (Stanford)
Tim Tait (UC Irvine)
Alex Tapper (Imperial College London)
Neal Weiner (NYU)