Sinéad Farrington is a British

particle physicist Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) and b ...

who works on the

ATLAS experiment ATLAS is the largest general-purpose particle detector experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a particle accelerator at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Switzerland. The experiment is designed to take advantage ...

at the

Large Hadron Collider The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008 in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists and hundr ...

. Farrington is interested in

B physics The bottom quark or b quark, also known as the beauty quark, is a third-generation heavy quark with a charge of − ''e''. All quarks are described in a similar way by electroweak and quantum chromodynamics, but the bottom quark has excep ...

Higgs physics The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the fields in particle physics theory. In the St ...

, tau physics, and long-lived particles. She is a Professor of Physics at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

. In December 2020 Farrington was named the physical sciences and engineering laureate for the

Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists was established in 2007 through a partnership between the Blavatnik Family Foundation, headed by Leonard Blavatnik (Russian: Леонид Валентинович Блаватник), chairman of Access Indust ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

2021.

Early life and education

Farrington was born in

Torphins Torphins ( ; gd, Tòrr Fionn) is a village in Royal Deeside, Aberdeenshire, Scotland which lies about west of Aberdeen. It is situated on the A980, about north-west of Banchory, and was once served by the Great North of Scotland Railway. ...

Aberdeenshire Aberdeenshire ( sco, Aiberdeenshire; gd, Siorrachd Obar Dheathain) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. It takes its name from the County of Aberdeen which has substantially different boundaries. The Aberdeenshire Council area incl ...

, Scotland, to John Farrington, a Professor of Geography at the

University of Aberdeen , mottoeng = The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom , established = , type = Public research universityAncient university , endowment = £58.4 million (2021) , budget ...

, and Bernadette, a primary school teacher. She has one younger brother Conor. She attended

St Margaret's School for Girls St Margaret’s School for Girls is the oldest all-through girls’ school in Scotland and caters for pupils aged three to 18 in a nursery, junior school and senior school. St Margaret’s is an independent charitable trust that warmly welcomes gir ...

in Aberdeen before studying physics at the

. She remained in Scotland for her doctoral research, moving to the

University of Glasgow , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

. Her research was on a measurement of the lifetime of the

strange B meson The meson is a meson composed of a bottom antiquark and a strange quark. Its antiparticle is the meson, composed of a bottom quark and a strange antiquark. B–B oscillations Strange B mesons are noted for their ability to oscillate between ...

as part of the

Collider Detector at Fermilab The Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) experimental collaboration studies high energy particle collisions from the Tevatron, the world's former highest-energy particle accelerator. The goal is to discover the identity and properties of the partic ...

(CDF) collaboration.

Research and career

After completing her doctorate, Farrington joined the

University of Liverpool , mottoeng = These days of peace foster learning , established = 1881 – University College Liverpool1884 – affiliated to the federal Victoria Universityhttp://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/2004/4 University of Manchester Act 200 ...

as a research Fellow and whilst based at

Fermilab Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located just outside Batavia, Illinois, near Chicago, is a United States Department of Energy United States Department of Energy National Labs, national laboratory specializing in high-energy parti ...

co-led the CDF team that first established matter-antimatter oscillations in the B⁰_s system. Farrington went on to hold an

Science and Technology Facilities Council The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) is a United Kingdom government agency that carries out research in science and engineering, and funds UK research in areas including particle physics, nuclear physics, space science and astro ...

(STFC) advanced fellowship at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in contin ...

and a junior Kurti fellowship at

Brasenose College, Oxford Brasenose College (BNC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It began as Brasenose Hall in the 13th century, before being founded as a college in 1509. The library and chapel were added in the m ...

. In 2011 she joined the department of physics at the

University of Warwick , mottoeng = Mind moves matter , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £7.0 million (2021) , budget = £698.2 million (202 ...

where she set up her own research group on ATLAS. During this period she co-led the team on ATLAS that measured the decay 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 quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the fields in particle physics theory. In the St ...

to tau leptons establishing for the first time a

Yukawa coupling In particle physics, Yukawa's interaction or Yukawa coupling, named after Hideki Yukawa, is an interaction between particles according to the Yukawa potential. Specifically, it is a scalar field (or pseudoscalar field) and a Dirac field of the ty ...

of a scalar Higgs to fermions. She moved to the

in 2018. She has also held a CERN associateship, is a senior experimental fellow at the Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology at Durham University and is a visiting professor at the University of Oxford. She was awarded a

European Research Council The European Research Council (ERC) is a public body for funding of scientific and technological research conducted within the European Union (EU). Established by the European Commission in 2007, the ERC is composed of an independent Scientif ...

consolidator grant in 2018, to develop triggers and analysis techniques to allow searches for long-lived particles decaying to tau particles at the

. Since 2019, Farrington has been the Principal Investigator (spokesperson) for the 15 UK institutes on the ATLAS collaboration.

Recognition

In 2020 Farrington was named the

Faculty Winner for the United Kingdom. She was elected to the

Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soc ...

in 2022.

Selected publications

* * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Farrington, Sinead Year of birth missing (living people) Living people People from Aberdeenshire Alumni of the University of Glasgow Alumni of the University of Edinburgh Academics of the University of Liverpool Academics of the University of Edinburgh Fellows of Brasenose College, Oxford Academics of the University of Warwick People associated with CERN British women physicists Particle physicists Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh