Joseph Bullock, one of the students from our 2017 cohort of the CDT for Data Intensive Science, worked as an AI Research Fellow with UN Global Pulse, New York for his secondment to non-academic partners. More info can be found at https://ddis.physics.dur.ac.uk/joe-bullock-ai-fellow-at-un-global-pulse/

The IPPP welcomed 170 scientists and members from the funding agency STFC for the 2018 edition of the Annual Theory Meeting. See https://www.ippp.dur.ac.uk/annual-theory-meetings for the agenda and for the long history of this event.

Our friend and colleague James Stirling passed away after a short illness on Friday 9 November. James shared an appointment between Physics and Mathematical Sciences until he became the inaugural Director of IPPP in 2000. He became PVC for Research in 2005 and before taking up the Jacksonian Chair of Natural Philosophy in Cambridge in 2008. In 2013 he became Provost of Imperial College, retiring in July 2018. More info about James' life can be found here and here.

Marian Heil was jointly awarded the Elsevier Research Prize by the Physics Department in recognition of the results he achieved and got published already during the first year of his PhD studies.

The IPPP seeks to appoint talented individuals to the role of Assistant Professor in Particle Physics Phenomenology. The application deadline is 10th January 2019. More information can be found underhttps://www.dur.ac.uk/jobs/recruitment/vacancies/phys18-10/

The IPPP is currently advertising on Academic Jobs Online and the Durham University jobs website for Research Associate Positions. The deadline for applications onAcademic jobs online is 1st December. Based on that we will create a short list. People on the short list will also have to apply via the Durham University jobs website before 7th January 2019.

The IPPP was awarded the Research Impact Fund from Durham University earlier this year for bringing their outreach exhibition Modelling the Invisible to the Orkney Science Festival and to Gravity Fields in Grantham. The IPPP has now taken part at the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition for two years in a row. More information can be found at www.modellinginvisible.org

Ramona Gröber, postdoctoral researcher at the IPPP, has been offered a W2 professorship for 5 years at the Humboldt-University in Berlin, Germany. Ramona has joint the IPPP in October 2016 and has been working on Higgs physics and beyond the Standard Model phenomenology during her time in Durham. She will leave us for her new position by the end of September 2018. We wish her all the best for her future and hope that she will stay in close scientific contact with us.

Application for the next round of IPPP Associateships and Senior Experimental Fellowships is open. The deadline is 31st August 2018 2018-2019 Senior Experimental Fellows These are awarded to small teams led by senior UK experimentalists and involving more junior researchers (postdocs and students) to support participation of UK experimentalists in the IPPP Phenomenology Network. The Fellowships are for one calendar year with a possibility of extension for another year. Starting date 1 January 2019. The Senior Experimental Fellowships are funded by IPPP, and are intended to cover travel and local expenses to support visits of the team to Durham. The goal of the Fellowships is to support IPPP engagement with UK experimentalists, to stimulate their participation in the IPPP UK phenomenology network by strengthening research links, and to create new initiatives between the experimental and theoretical communities in the UK. Applications for Senior Experimental Fellowships are invited...

We are looking for a new colleague working on Monte Carlo event generators (HERWIG). The deadline is 2nd August, more information under:https://recruitment.durham.ac.uk/pls/corehrrecruit/erq_jobspec_details_f...

The IPPP is taking part at the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition 2018 - starting on Monday 2nd July - with a stand on neutrino physics. More information can be found at https://ghostsintheuniverse.org/ Additional information can also be found on the University website: https://www.dur.ac.uk/news/newsitem/?itemno=35159

Prof. Michael Spannowsky was awarded the Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt foundation for outstanding contributions to research and teaching. For a list of his scientific publications see http://inspirehep.net/author/profile/M.Spannowsky.1 Scientists and scholars from abroad, internationally renowned in their field, who completed their doctorates less than 18 years ago and who in future are expected to continue producing cutting-edge achievements which will have a seminal influence on their discipline beyond their immediate field of work, are eligible to be nominated for a Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award. Award winners are honoured for their outstanding research record and invited to spend a period of up to one year cooperating on a long-term research project with specialist colleagues at a research institution in Germany. The stay may be divided up into blocks.

Our first award to the DIVA program goes to Prof. Seung Joon Lee, Korea University. Prof. Seung Joon Lee will be visiting for 4 weeks, including seminars at IPPP and Sussex during mid-June to mid-July 2018. Visit our DIVA program page for more information.

Professor Michael Pennington: 1946 - 2018 As Head of the Department of Physics from 1999 to 2003, Mike Pennington played a key role in developing the Department as it is today, through the establishment of the Ogden Centre for Fundamental Physics and the creation of two world leading Research Institutes: the Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology and the Institute for Computational Cosmology. Mike first came to Durham as temporary Lecturer in Physics on leave from CERN for a term in 1976 and again in 1977. He then returned in 1978 as a senior research assistant, followed by joint appointments in the Departments of Physics and Mathematical Sciences as Research Officer (1981), Senior Lecturer (1990), Reader (1994) and Professor (1997). He held many leadership positions at Durham. As well as serving as an outstanding Head of the Department of Physics, he was Chair of the Physics Teaching & Learning Committee from 1999 to 2001, Chair of the University IT Strategy Working Group...

IPPP PhD students Tom Jubb and Philip Waite were exceeding all expectations during an internship at Kromek: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6385153652180553728

IPPP postdoc Gurpreet Singh Chahal won the CMS 2017 Achievement Award for "leadership in the Physics Data Monte Carlo Validation team, and for outstanding contributions to management of the production of Monte Carlo simulation events and, in particular, for dedication to the production of upgrade samples for preparation of the technical design reports of Phase-2 upgrade of the CMS detector". The award ceremony took place on February 5th at CERN, photos of Gurpreet with CMS Spokesperson Joel Butler (Fermilab) and CMS Collaboration Board Deputy Chair Robin Erbacher (UC Davis) below.