Brisbane Public Lecture: Enlightening the search for dark matter

The National Quantum & Dark Matter Road Trip is a travelling science show, bringing all things quantum and dark matter to a town near you!  To coincide with National Science Week, a team of scientists and science communicators will travel around Australia, delivering engaging presentations, hands-on activities, pub quizzes and more!

National Quantum and Dark Matter Road Trip

Discover how and why we hunt for dark matter with Dr Ben Roberts as part of the National Quantum & Dark Matter Road Trip.

Parnell Lecture Theatre 07-222

Join the National Quantum &amp; Dark Matter Road Trip in Brisbane to how and why we hunt for dark matter with Dr Ben Roberts.Date: Monday 21 August 2023Time: 6:30–8:00 pm: public lecture and Q&amp;AVenue: Parnell Lecture Theatre 07-222, The University of Queensland, St Lucia QLD 4072This is a FREE event.Speaker: Dr Ben Roberts

Title: Enlightening the search for dark matterThe great cosmic mystery of dark matter is one of the big open questions in modern physics. According to astrophysical observations, about 85% of the matter in the Universe is dark matter. Despite this, dark matter has never been directly observed, and we have essentially no idea about its microscopic quantities. By far, most experiments searching for dark matter focus on WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles), heavy weak-scale particles with masses of 10 to 1,000 times that of the proton. As WIMP searches continue to measure zero, the interest in wider range of possibilities is growing. In fact, the range of possible masses that dark matter could have spans an unimaginable 90 orders of magnitude. Most current experiments are blind to the majority of this range. Taking advantage of atomic (rather than the typical nuclear) phenomena, however, may drastically increase the range of masses we can search for. In this talk, I’ll discuss why we believe so strongly in particle dark matter, and discuss some of the work at the forefront of this search.Speaker: Dr Ben RobertsBen Roberts is an ARC DECRA Fellow at the University of Queensland. He works in atomic structure theory, with applications to probing for physics beyond the standard model, and searching for dark matter and exotic physics.The National Quantum &amp; Dark Matter Road Trip is bringing all things quantum and dark matter to communities around Australia as part of National Science Week. A team of scientists and science communicators will be visiting schools, libraries, pubs and other community hubs from 7 to 25 August, aiming to inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers and highlight the potential of quantum technologies and dark matter discovery for the future of our society.We are very grateful to The University of Queensland for their support of this event.Visit <a href="https://www.qdmroadtrip.org/" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">qdmroadtrip.or</a>g for more or follow @qdmroadtrip on <a href="https://twitter.com/qdmroadtrip" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Twitter </a>and <a href="https://www.instagram.com/qdmroadtrip/" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Instagram</a>.

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Brisbane Public Lecture: Enlightening the search for dark matter

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Brisbane Public Lecture: Enlightening the search for dark matter

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