Open Position PhD Student Position for the ATLAS Group

About IFAE

The Institut de Física d’Altes Energies (IFAE) is a public consortium of the Generalitat de Catalunya, the Autonomous Government of Catalonia, and the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB, a public university) whose main objective is to carry out research and to contribute to the development of high energy physics from a theoretical, experimental and technological point of view. IFAE has the status of a “University Institute" attached to the UAB and its premises are within the campus of the University. IFAE is an internationally recognized center for fundamental research in Particle Physics, Astroparticle Physics, and Cosmology. IFAE offers an international, dynamic, and competitive environment for the training of young researchers. IFAE has been accredited three times with the “Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence” distinction, most recently for the 2025-2029 period.

About the ATLAS group

The Collider Physics group at IFAE is focused on the scientific exploitation of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. This is research line that started in 1992, when IFAE joined the ATLAS Collaboration at the LHC. The ATLAS detector was designed to explore a wide range of phenomena predicted by the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics, while also maximizing their sensitivity to beyond-the-SM processes. It is expected that these investigations will provide answers to open questions in our description of Nature such as the origin of the particle masses, the mechanism for electroweak symmetry breaking, or the presence of a new underlying symmetry (e.g., supersymmetry) that could explain the nature of dark matter or the unification of forces at very high energies. The design, construction and operation of the ATLAS detector, online event selection, event reconstruction and data analysis, all require world-wide efforts, which are reflected in the size of the ATLAS Collaboration, formed by 181 institutions from 42 countries. Its members are a team of physicists, engineers, technicians, students and support staff from around the world. It is one of the largest collaborative efforts ever attempted in science, with over 5500 members and almost 3000 scientific authors.

With a 30-year involvement in the ATLAS experiment, IFAE has played mayor roles in the construction and operation of the Tile Hadronic Calorimeter (TileCal), the preparation of the High-Level Trigger infrastructure and physics selection algorithms, and the physics analyses. IFAE currently maintains a strong presence in the ATLAS experiment, with major responsibilities on the maintenance and operation of the TileCal hadronic calorimeter and the Level-1 Topological Trigger system, and participates in the Pixel detector upgrade. The group has also developed an exciting and broad research program that includes precision measurements of the top quark (e.g., four-top-quark production) and the Higgs boson (e.g., top-Higgs Yukawa coupling, di-Higgs production), and searches for new phenomena beyond the Standard Model (e.g., supersymmetry, vector-like fermions, leptoquarks, additional light or heavy Higgs bosons, etc). During Run 3 of the LHC, which started in July 2022 and will last till mid 2026, the centre-of-mass energy of proton-proton collisions has been increased to 13.6 TeV and the total delivered integrated luminosity will reach ~300 fb-1. With the increase of both energy and integrated luminosity with respect to Run 2, more stringent tests of the SM and more sensitive searches for new phenomena will be possible. IFAE is in a privileged position to analyse the ATLAS data, with strong synergies with IFAE’s Theory Division and significant computing resources from the PIC computing centre.

Required skills and evaluation criteria

The successful candidate is expected to have:

• Master’s in Physics or satisfy the requirements to be admitted in the Physics PhD program of the UAB (https://www.uab.cat/en/phds/physics ) before the start of the grant
• Proficiency in the English language
• Pro-active attitude and good communication skills
• Research experience in experimental particle physics during the Master studies.

The evaluation criteria and their weighting for the submitted applications will be the following:
EVALUATION CRITERIA:

• Grades in BsC and MsC, 25
• Proficiency in the English language, 25
• Programming and computing skills, 25
• Research experience, 25

What will be your role?

The candidate should have a University degree in Physics or related topics and a Master degree. The candidate will join the IFAE-ATLAS group and participate in first-class research with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. He/she will play a leading role in physics analysis using the full Run 2 and Run 3 datasets, and participate in the maintenance and operation of the ATLAS detector.

Offered contract:

• Full-time contract (40 hours/week).
• Predoctoral Contract
• The position will correspond to “Predoctoral Researcher (R1)” within the professional categories of the IFAE.
• Salary will be proportional to experience and qualifications within the corresponding category range.
• Work with interesting experimental science. Travelling to scientific singular infrastructures. Opportunity to gain experience learning first-hand. Personal growth, innovation, and learning every day.
• The selected candidate is expected to join the IFAE as soon as possible.

Application and Selection process:

Applications should be submitted to Dr. Imma Riu (Imma.Riu@cern.ch ) and rrhh@ifae.es stating the job reference (IFAE2025/28_ATLAS_SO_PhDStudent) as the subject of the message. The mail should include an up-to-date CV, a motivation letter and a full list of university grades, and arrange to have two letters of reference sent to the above e-mail addresses.

Sending CVs to the above addresses implies consent to the IFAE’s legal warning on data privacy.

The application must contain a personal identification number (DNI, NIE or passport) in order to proceed to the verification of absence of conflict of interest required by Recovery and Resilience Mechanism of the Spanish Government.

IFAE is an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity in the workplace and social integration of people with a disability. We welcome applications from all qualified candidates. People from groups that are typically underrepresented in the labour market in general and in Science and Engineering in particular, such as women, minorities, or people with a disability, are particularly encouraged to apply.

A Selection Committee will evaluate the received applications. If more than one candidate seems equally suitable for the position, the Selection Committee will arrange an on-line interview with each one of them as part of the Selection process.

In compliance with article 121 of the Spanish Public Sector Legal Regime Act, staff with a pre-existing relationship with the Consortium administration (Generalitat de Catalunya and Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) will have priority in the awarding of the position.

You may contact Dr. Imma Riu (Imma.Riu@cern.ch ) for any questions related to this job opening.

Funding Statement

Esta plaza está financiada en el marco de la acreditación Severo Ochoa de IFAE CEX2024-001441-S (2025–2028), concedida por el MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033.