Silvia Arcelli was born in Bologna on May 1st, 1967. The subject of her research activity is high energy subnuclear physics. She has been a member of the OPAL collaboration at LEP and of the CMS experiment at the LHC. She is presently a member of the ALICE collaboration, the experiment dedicated to the study of ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions at the LHC. She is currently participating also in the DarkSide project at LNGS, to search for dark matter with a large liquid Argon detector under construction.
She is co-author of more than 550 scientific publications, and presented her research activity at several national and international conferences and workshops, often as invited talks (h-index (SPIRES)=100, h-index (WOS)=69).
Career:
-1990: Laurea degree in Physics at the Bologna University, magna cum laude.
-1991: INFN fellowship for Graduate Students.
-1995: P.h.d. in Physics defending the thesis: ``Misura di precisione della Luminosita' e determinazione dei Parametri Elettrodeboli della Z0 con il rivelatore OPAL al LEP''.
-1997: Award of the Italian Physics Society for young researchers in Physics.
-1996-1997: Two-year Post-Doc fellowship at the Bologna University
-1998-2000: Research Associate at the High Energy Physics Department of the Maryland University, USA.
-2000-2004: Research Associate at the Physics Department of the Bologna University.
-2004-2005: "Senior Grant" at the Museo Storico della Fisica e Centro Studi e Ricerche E.Fermi.
-2005-2014: Assistant Professor (Experimental Physics , FIS/01) , Department of Physics and Astronomy, Bologna University,Italy.
-2014-Now: Associate Professor (Experimental Physics , FIS/01), Department of Physics and Astronomy, Bologna University, Italy .
-2017-Now: Coordinator of the PhD programme in Physics , Department of Physics and Astronomy, Bologna University, Italy .
Scientific Activity:
1) From 1991 to 2003 she has been a member of the OPAL (Omni Purpose Apparatus for LEP) experiment at LEP , studying electron-positron collisions near the Z0 vector boson resonance(LEP1) and above the WW pair production threshold (LEP2) up to 209 GeV center-of-mass energy. Major results of the experiment have been very accurate measurements of several parameters of the Standard Model (both in the electroweak and in the strong sector) , limits on the production of new phenomena beyond the Standard Model, and a throuroug study of the properties of heavy quarks b and c. Her scientific activity covered both more technical aspects, connected to the operation, calibration and monitoring of the OPAL luminometers (Forward Detector FD and SiW Luminometer) and of the OPAL Hadron Calorimeter (HCAL), and several physics analyses spanning from electroweak measurements , heavy quark production and search of particles beyond the Standard Model.
Selected Contributions to Physics Analysis as a main author in OPAL:
• Precision Measurement of the Luminosity with The SiW luminomer (<0.1% experimental accuracy, mandatory for a precise determination of the Z0 invisible width);
• Determination of the electroweak parameters of the Z0 at LEP1, through the Lineshape Analysis;
• Two-fermion production e+e- -->f f(bar) at LEP2;
• Measurement of Rb and Ab(FB) at LEP2, using b-tagging techniques based on the OPAL microvertex;
• Isolated photons with missing energy at LEP2, for the determination of the number of light neutrinos, and searches for new physics decaying into invisible states.
• Anomalous Triple Gauge Couplings Z-Z-photon, Z-photon-photon a LEP2.
Responsabilities in OPAL:
• Responsible of the Monte Carlo simulation for the luminosity measurement with the OPAL SiW luminometer;
• Responsible of the luminosity measurement in the LEP2 phase;
• Responsible of the OPAL Hadron Calorimeter (operation, monitoring, calibration,data quality, simulation) ;
• “On Call” expert during data taking for the OPAL Forward Detectors (FD, SiW Luminometer) and for the OPAL hadron calorimeter;
• Shift leader (“e+e- expert”) during data taking.
Responsabilities in the LEP general Working Groups :
• OPAL representative for the neutrino-antineutrino photon (photon) channel
within the Monte Carlo Workshop for precision calculations at LEP2;
• Member of the LEP Electroweak Working Group for the combination of the electroweak measurements at LEP ;
• Member of the LEPS Susy Working group for the combinations of the results of the photon (photon)+missing transverse energy channels.
2) From 2000 to 2003, she has been a member of the CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). As a Research Associate of the Hgh Energy group of the Maryland University, she contributed to the design and the optimizaton of the CMS hadron calorimeter Level 1/2 Triggers. From 2001 to 2003, she worked as a research associate of the INFN Bologna group responsible for the construction of the Drift Tubes (DT) chamber of the CMS muon system. During this period, she took part to the construction and testing of the muon DT chambers both in Bologna and at LNL, and was responsible of the Monte Carlo simulation for the Muon Barrel detector group in CMS. She contributed to the design and the optimization of the level 1/2/3 Trigger Selections for the CMS muon system, and to several preparation studies for future physics analyses.
Selected Contributions to Preparation Studies and Physics Analysis as a main author in CMS:
• Optimization of the Lv1 Trigger selections of the CMS hadron Calorimeter
• Optimization of the Triggers algorythms (Lv1/2/3) for the CMS muon system
• Preparation Study for the detection of the MSSM Higgs in the H/A->mu+mu- channel.
Responsabilities in CMS:
• Coordinator of the pre-production and testing of the cathodes co of the CMS Muon Barrel Drift Tubes , INFN-Bologna; Construction and testing of DT chambers in the INFN Legnaro National Laboratory
• Responsible of the Monte Carlo production for the CMS muon system reconstruction and simulation group (Muon PRS, Physics Reconstruction and Selection).
3) In 2004 she started her scientific activity in the ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) collaboration, dedicated to the study of ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions at the LHC, as a member of the INFN/University Bologna group for the time-of-flight (TOF) detector. Based on Multi-Gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC), the Time of Flight system covers the pseudorapidity interval [−0.9, +0.9] and the full azimuthal angle, and provides Particle Identification (PID) in the region of intermediate momenta (0.5 - 4.0 GeV/c) for charged hadrons (pions, kaons and protons).
She has been responsible of the simulation and the reconstruction software, having a leading role in the their design and development. She has also been one of the major contributors to the development and optimization of the TOF Particle Identification algorithms, exploiting a Bayesian approach. She designed the major part of the software for the calibration, alignment and Data Quality Monitoring of the TOF using physics events during data taking. Se also has developed, coordinating a group of 4 researchers, a framework for the calculation of acceptance and efficiency corrections (Correction Framework) currently used within the ALICE collaboration.
Her physics analysis activity focusses on the study of the properties of identified charged hadrons in the central pseudorapidity region and on the production of hadronic resonances in Pb-Pb, p-p e p-Pb collisions. She has been heavily involved in the precision measurement of the mass differences between light nuclei and anti-nuclei. The result, published in Nature Physics, improves the constraints on CPT invariancein the light-nuclei sector by a factor of 10-100.
Selected Contributions to Physics Analyses in ALICE:
• Identified hadrons transverse momentum spectra in proton-proton and Pb-Pb collisions;
• Production of phi/K* resonances in p-p, Pb-p and Pb-Pb collisions.
• Anisotropic flow (v2,v3) of identified hadrons Pb-Pb collisions.
• Production of light (anti-)nuclei in Pb-Pb collisions and precision measurement of their masses.
Responsabilities in ALICE:
• Member of the ALICE Computing Board;
• Responsible of the development and optimization of the simulation,reconstruction and identification software for the ALICE Time of Flight System TOF .
• Responsible for the TOF detector within the Working Group for the preparation of the ALICE Physics Performance Report (PPR) ;
• Responsible of the design and development of the software for the determination of acceptance and efficiency corrections to physics analyses (ALICE Correction Framework)
Other Activities :
-She is regularly serving as a referee for the following journals: The European Physical Journal C (EPJC), The European Physical Journal-Plus (EPJ-Plus), The Journal of Instrumentation (JINST);
-Supervision of young researcher s for Bachelor (6) and Master Degree(8) and PhD (2) Thesis in Physics;
