“Actually, the Standard Model of Particle Physics is an incredibly good model that can describe nature and the universe almost completely. But only almost – and that’s why my research focuses precisely on this ‘almost’. This means I develop models that can explain phenomena where the Standard Model falls short.

And now it gets exciting: Our experimental colleagues provide concrete indications of deviations from the Standard Model – for example, in the measurement of the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon or in certain decays of B-mesons. This motivates us to search for extensions to the Standard Model that can explain these discrepancies, and to propose new measurements that can validate or falsify these models. For example, I have worked on models that contain a leptoquark – a new, heavy particle that could explain the current striking data in B-meson physics.

In Mainz, I primarily focus on extremely light and weakly interacting particles – Axion-like Particles or ALPs. They appear in many models. Currently, I am investigating the decay of a kaon into a pion and an ALP. The non-observation of this process represents one of the strongest constraints on the coupling strength of a light ALP, and I am trying to improve the theoretical prediction of the decay rate.

For me, physics is always teamwork, and I find this ideally reflected in the group in Mainz. In my opinion, the continuous exchange between theory and experiment is the heart of science. What particularly fascinates me is the constant cycle of question, answer, and doubt. This is how we continually find new ways of seeing things, ultimately to answer very fundamental questions.

Dr. Claudia Cornella has been a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Dr. Matthias Neubert’s group since October 2021. She studied in Italy and received her doctoral degree from the University of Zurich. She also particularly likes the German language, so Mainz already feels like home to her.