Full Professor of General Physics at the University of Bologna since 2005, he carries out his research activity in the field of Elementary Particle Physics. Member of the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider of CERN in Geneva, he is co-author of over 1100 publications in international journals (Scopus h-index = 118, Google Scolar h-index = 208).
Winner of the "Pietro Bassi" prize of the Italian Physics Society for the "Contributions to meson spectroscopy".
Winner of the 2013 HEPP European Physical Society Award (High Energy and Particle Physics Prize of the European Physical Society), as a member of the ATLAS collaboration, for the discovery of the Higgs boson.
He was member of the Board of Alma Mater Foundation, Senator of Alma Mater and Director of the Department of Physics and Astronomy "Augusto Righi" from 2015 to 2021.
Recently he has designed and coordinated the realization of "Physics Experience", an innovative museum on the concepts of space and time of the Bologna University.
Academic Position
1985 Degree in Physics with marks 110/110 cum laude. Thesis on the weak interactions: "Muon capture by protons and deuterons";
1986 Scholarship of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN) for "Research in Nuclear Physics with Electromagnetic and hadronic probes";
1988 Researcher of INFN (section of Bologna);
1999 Associate Professor of Physics (University of Bologna, Fis01);
Award 2002 "Pietro Bassi" of the Società Italiana di Fisica (SIF) for "the contributions to meson spectroscopy";
2005 Full Professor (University of Bologna, Fis01).
1985 Degree in Physics with 110/110 cum laude. Thesis on weak interactions: "Capture of Muons by Protons and Deutons"
1986 Scholarship from the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) for "Research in Nuclear Physics with hadronic and electromagnetic probes"
1988 Researcher at the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN)
1999 Associate Professor of General Physics at the University of Bologna
2002 "Pietro Bassi" Award of the Italian Physical Society for "Contributions to meson spectroscopy"
2005 Full Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Bologna
2010 Member of the Board of the Alma Mater Foundation
2011 Member of the Board of the Almacube Consortium
2013 Winner of the High Energy and Particle Physics Prize of the European Physical Society (HEPP 2013), as a member of the ATLAS collaboration, for the discovery of the Higgs boson
2015 Director of the Department of Physics and Astronomy
2015 Member of the Academic Senate
2018 Director of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, second term
Teaching
Institutional courses of Nuclear and Subnuclear Physics, General Physics I, General Physics II and Modern Physics at the University of Bologna.
Statistical Mechanics Course at the Doctoral School of the Research Center on Electronic Systems for Information and Telecommunications Engineering, Center of Excellence of the University of Bologna.
Supervisor of numerous Bachelor's, Master's and Doctoral Theses.
Member of the Doctoral School in Physics.
Member of the Doctoral School "The Future of the Earth, Climate Change and Social Challenges".
Outreach
Introductory articles on the concept of energy, multilingual Geopolitics site “Cartografare il Presente”, International Committee for Cartography and Analysis of the Contemporary World, Department of Historical Disciplines of the University of Bologna.
Introductory article on elementary particle physics "The Standard Model of elementary particles: The new atomism?", Chimica & Industria Online, official organ of the Italian Chemical Society, 250th anniversary of Dalton's birth.
Intuitive Thought, Imola 7 April 2016.
Physics and Music, Imola 23 February 2017.
Meetings at the Academy of Sciences: Bizarre Quantum Behavior: Copenhagen Interpretation, Bologna 30 April 2019.
Courses in Theory of Special Relativity at the G. Occhialini Foundation, from 2013 to date.
Design and implementation of "Physics Experience", an innovative museum on the concepts of space and time of the Bologna University.
Textbooks
Lezioni di Elettromagnetismo: Bertin, N. Semprini Cesari, A. Vitale & A. Zoccoli, Esculapio Editore.
Esercizi di Elettromagnetismo: A. Bertin, S. De Castro, N. Semprini Cesari, A. Vitale & A. Zoccoli, Esculapio Editore
Department and University
Member of the Board of the Department of Physics
Member of the Board of the Department of Physics and Astronomy
Member of the Board of AlmaCube
Member of the Board of the Alma Mater Foundation
Member of the Academic Senate
Director of the Department of Physics and Astronomy (2015-2021)
Scientific responsabilities
Member of the Terza Commissione Scientifica Nazionale of INFN
INFN Local Responsible of Obelix experiment
Member of the Collaboration Board of the LHC-b experiment at the CERN International Laboratories in Geneva
Research Activities
The scientific activity, mainly in the field of Elementary Particle Physics, is carried out at the Gran Sasso International Laboratory (L'Aquila, Italy), DESY (Hamburg, Germany) and CERN (Geneva, Switzerland).
Currently a member of ATLAS experiment at the new Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the scientific activity is documented in more than 1100 publications in international journals (Scopus h-index = 118, Google Scolar h-index = 208), invited talks and contributions to international conferences in the following areas of physics:
- Physics at LHC with the ATLAS experiment;
- Nuclear fusion in deuterated metals;
- Antiproton and Antineutron physics;
- Heavy quark physics;
- Phenomenology;
- Experimental Techniques.
Physics at LHC with the ATLAS experiment
In 2002, together with a group of 20 physicists from the Department of Physics and Astronomy of Bologna University and INFN Bologna Section, I joined the ATLAS Collaboration to study and realize the luminometer of the experiment (Cerenkov tubes). The experiment, designed to explore the frontier of very high energies by means of proton-proton collisions, among the results obtained in 2013 discovered the Higgs boson.
Heavy quark physics
Systematic study of heavy quark production dynamics by proton beams of very high energy (900 GeV). The main results are: Cross section production of bottom quarks (Top Cite); Limits on cross section production of five-quark states (TopCite).
Antiproton and Antineutron physics
A significant part of the scientific activity concerns the systematic study of light meson spectrum by annihilation reactions at rest. Among the most relevant results achieved the first direct measurement of the decay widths into pairs of pions and kaons of exotic state f0(1500) (essential to measure the gluonio content, average and best values of the Particle Data Group).
Muon Physics
Muon catalyzed fusion (MCF): cross sections production of pions and muons by high energy proton beams for Mcf purposes. Energy cost of muons in deuterium-tritium targets.
Nuclear fusion in deuterated metals
Search for 'cold fusion' effects.
Phenomenology
Constant is the interest in various areas of particle and fundamental physics:
'Neutrino Puzzle' (NP) and the Standard Model of the Sun (MSS): in the context of studies on semileptonic weak interaction constants, it has been established for the first time the ga(0) dependence of neutrino flux emitted by the sun;
Effects of G-parity violation in strong interactions;
Unitary formalisms in meson spectroscopy;
Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Mascawa matrix: review on the state of knowledge of CKM matrix elements (Top Cite);
Quantum interference of electrons: through nanoscale slits and a fast recording system (pixel matrix, 106 frames/second) placed inside an electron microscope, we have registered single electron events on single 'photographic plate ' off-line reconstructing the interference pattern and studying event time correlations.
Experimental Techniques
Neutron detection: design and implementation of an innovative detector based on lithium glasses immersed in NE213 scintillator for spectrometry in the energy range between 0.5 and 5 MeV.
Gamma ray detection: design, construction and installation of the Obelix electromagnetic calorimeter for gamma detection in the energy range between 50 MeV and 1 GeV. It was also designed and built the readout electronics, the trigger and data acquisition system.
Trigger systems and electronic read-out: design and realization of read-out and pretrigger system of Hera-b electromagnetic calorimeter.
Cerenkov tube: design, construction and commissioning of the ATLAS luminometer.
Development of new pixel sensor for experiments in high energy physics: research and development of new arrays of pixels (with low budget material) and fast read-out architectures.
