Felicitas Pauss
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Felicitas Pauss (born March 26, 1951 in Vorau, Austria) is an Austrian
physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate cau ...
. She was elected Professor for Experimental
Particle physics Particle physics or high-energy physics is the study of Elementary particle, fundamental particles and fundamental interaction, forces that constitute matter and radiation. The field also studies combinations of elementary particles up to the s ...
at
ETH Zurich ETH Zurich (; ) is a public university in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 1854 with the stated mission to educate engineers and scientists, the university focuses primarily on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. ETH Zurich ran ...
, Switzerland, in 1993. Her research activities concentrated on two main research fields: particle physics at the high-energy frontier and
astroparticle physics Astroparticle physics, also called particle astrophysics, is a branch of particle physics that studies elementary particles of astrophysical origin and their relation to astrophysics and cosmology. It is a relatively new field of research emergi ...
, addressing fundamental open questions about the structure of the Universe and the underlying mechanisms that govern its evolution.


Career

Felicitas Pauss obtained her PhD in theoretical physics and mathematics at the
University of Graz The University of Graz (, formerly: ''Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz'') is a public university, public research university located in Graz, Austria. It is the largest and oldest university in Styria, as well as the second-largest and second-old ...
(Austria) in 1976. Subsequently she took up a position at the
Max Planck Institute The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science (; abbreviated MPG) is a formally independent non-governmental and non-profit association of German research institutes. Founded in 1911 as the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, it was renamed to the M ...
in Munich (Germany), where she moved to the field of experimental particle physics. She continued her research at
Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...
(USA) and
CERN The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in Meyrin, western suburb of Gene ...
(Geneva, Switzerland) before being elected professor at ETH Zurich in 1993, where she directed the Institute for Particle Physics from 1997 till 2007. From January 2009 till March 2013 she was in charge of CERN’s International Relations. In April 2013, she resumed her activities at ETH and took up the function of adviser to the ETH president on international affairs. In June 2013, she was elected president of the Lecturers’ Conference of ETH Zurich, a position she held until retirement. From 2014 till 2019 she was first vice-president and then president a.i. of the Foundation Council of the
Swiss National Science Foundation The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF, German: , SNF; French: , FNS; Italian: ) is a science research support organisation mandated by the Swiss Federal Government. The Swiss National Science Foundation was established under private law b ...
. Felicitas Pauss has been member of the
Compact Muon Solenoid The Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment is one of two large general-purpose particle physics detectors built on the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Switzerland and France. The goal of the CMS experiment is to investigate a wide range ...
(CMS) collaboration at CERN’s
Large Hadron Collider The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle accelerator. It was built by the CERN, European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008, in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists, ...
(LHC) since the early 1990’s and fulfilled important management duties in CMS, one of the two large experiments at the LHC. She has strongly contributed to the design and construction of the CMS experiment, focusing on all aspects of the crystal
calorimeter A calorimeter is a device used for calorimetry, or the process of measuring the heat of chemical reactions or physical changes as well as heat capacity. Differential scanning calorimeters, isothermal micro calorimeters, titration calorimeters ...
. After having participated in the discovery of the
W and Z Bosons In particle physics, the W and Z bosons are vector bosons that are together known as the weak bosons or more generally as the intermediate vector bosons. These elementary particles mediate the weak interaction; the respective symbols are , , an ...
in 1983 ( UA1 Collaboration,
Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...
in physics in 1984 to
Carlo Rubbia Carlo Rubbia (born 31 March 1934) is an Italian particle physicist and inventor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Simon van der Meer for work leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN. Early life and educatio ...
, spokesperson of UA1), another highlight in her career was the discovery of the
Higgs Boson The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the excited state, quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the field (physics), fields in particl ...
with CMS in 2012. This discovery was recognised as important experimental input for the 2013 Nobel Prize in physics (
François Englert François, Baron Englert (; born 6 November 1932) is a Belgian theoretical physicist and 2013 Nobel Prize laureate. Englert is professor emeritus at the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), where he is a member of the Service de Physique Thé ...
and
Peter Higgs Peter Ware Higgs (29 May 1929 – 8 April 2024) was a British theoretical physicist, professor at the University of Edinburgh,Griggs, Jessica (Summer 2008The Missing Piece ''Edit'' the University of Edinburgh Alumni Magazine, p. 17 and Nobel ...
). In 2003, Felicitas Pauss started a new field of research at ETH Zurich: the detection of very high-energy gamma rays from galactic and extragalactic sources with the Cherenkov telescope
MAGIC Magic or magick most commonly refers to: * Magic (supernatural), beliefs and actions employed to influence supernatural beings and forces ** ''Magick'' (with ''-ck'') can specifically refer to ceremonial magic * Magic (illusion), also known as sta ...
(in La Palma, Spain). In addition, her group successfully designed, constructed and operated a novel camera concept based on Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPMs) with associated readout electronics in 2011 (FACT). This success had an important impact on the design of future telescopes for the
Cherenkov Telescope Array The Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO) is a multinational project to build a new generation of ground-based gamma-ray instruments in the energy range extending from some tens of GeV to about 300 TeV. It is proposed as an open obser ...
(CTA), the next generation of very high-energy gamma-ray observatories. By September 2024, Felicitas Pauss has published about 1’900 scientific papers ( INSPIRES-HEP), resulting in more than 230’000 citations (h-index = 208); she is co-author of 37 renowned papers (more than 500 citation, with 5 papers more than 2’500 citations). Felicitas Pauss gave more than 470 talks at international conferences, colloquia and seminars as well as talks for government officials, funding agencies and the general public. Felicitas Pauss has served on numerous national and international scientific advisory boards as well as in international evaluation panels.


Awards and Honors

* 2003: ''‘Grand Decoration of Honour’'' of the Federal Province of Styria (AT) * 2008: German Academy of Science Leopoldina, elected member (DE) * 2009: ''‘Cross of Honour for Science and Art, First Class’'' of the Republic of Austria * 2012: ''Erna Hamburger Prize'' of the EPFL-WISH foundation (CH) * 2013: Elected Member of the Executive Board of the Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) * 2013:
European Physical Society The European Physical Society (EPS) is a non-profit organisation whose purpose is to promote physics and physicists in Europe through methods such as physics outreach, supporting physicists to engage in the design and implementation of European s ...
's High Energy and Particle Physics Prize awarded to the ATLAS and CMS collaborations * 2014: Doctor Honoris Causa, Technical University Vienna (AT) * 2014:
Lise Meitner Elise Lise Meitner ( ; ; 7 November 1878 – 27 October 1968) was an Austrian-Swedish nuclear physicist who was instrumental in the discovery of nuclear fission. After completing her doctoral research in 1906, Meitner became the second woman ...
Lectures at the TU Berlin (DE) and TU Graz (AT), organized by the German and Austrian Physical Societies * 2016: European Academy of Sciences and Arts, elected member (Salzburg, AT) * 2017: ''Chaim Weizmann Lectureship'',
University of Fribourg The University of Fribourg (; ) is a public university located in Fribourg, Switzerland. The roots of the university can be traced back to 1580, when the notable Jesuit Peter Canisius founded the Collège Saint-Michel in the City of Fribourg ...
(CH) * 2017: ''Richard E. Ernst Gold Medal'', ETH Zurich (CH)


Publications (selection)

* ''Experimental Observation of Lepton Pairs of Invariant Mass Around 95 GeV/c**2 at the CERN SPS Collider'', UA1 Collaboration, Phys.Lett.B 126 (1983) 398-410
INSPIRE
* ''Search for the standard model Higgs boson at LEP ALEPH, DELPHI, L3 and OPAL Collaborations at LEP'', Phys.Lett.B 565 (2003) 61-75; e-Print: hep-ex/0306033 * ''Comparison between high-energy proton and charged pion induced damage in PbWO4 calorimeter crystals'', P. Lecomte, D. Luckey, F. Nessi-Tedaldi, F. Pauss, D. Renker, Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A 587 266–271 (2008); e-Print: 0709.4409 * ''The CMS electromagnetic calorimeter project : Technical Design Report'', CMS Collaboration, CERN-LHCC-97-033, CMS-TDR-4 * ''The CMS Experiment at the CERN LHC'', CMS Collaboration, JINST 3 (2008) S08004 * ''Observation of a New Boson at a Mass of 125 GeV with the CMS Experiment at the LHC'', CMS Collaboration, Phys.Lett.B 716 (2012) 30-61; e-Print: 1207.7235 * ''Precise determination of the mass of the Higgs boson and tests of compatibility of its couplings with the standard model predictions using proton collisions at 7 and 8'',  TeV CMS Collaboration, Eur.Phys.J.C 75 (2015) 5, 212; e-Print: 1412.8662 ep-ex * ''Design and operation of FACT – the first G-APD Cherenkov telescope'', FACT Collaboration, Journal of Instrumentation, Volume 8, June 2013, e-Print: 1304.1710 * ''Observation of pulsed gamma-rays above 25 GeV from the Crab pulsar with MAGIC'', MAGIC Collaboration, Science 322 1221 (2008); doi:10.1126/science.1164718 * ''Very-High-Energy Gamma Rays from a Distant Quasar: How Transparent Is the Universe?'', MAGIC Collaboration, Science 320 1752 (2008); doi:10.1126/science.1157087, e-Print: 0807.2822 * ''First Result from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station: Precision Measurement of the Positron Fraction in Primary Cosmic Rays of 0.5–350 GeV'', AMS Collaboration, Phys.Rev.Lett. 110 (2013) 141102; doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.141102


References


External links

*
Personal Website at ETH

AcademiaNet

“Persistent and curious”
myscience.ch, May 2017

Videoportal ETH Zurich, November 22, 2016.
Interview with Felicitas Pauss
Deputy chairperson CMS collaboration Board, CERN, 20 August 2008 {{DEFAULTSORT:Pauss, Felicitas Austrian women physicists Austrian physicists 1951 births Living people Academic staff of ETH Zurich People associated with CERN