Expansion of the research-strong physics quarter on the Gutenberg Campus in Mainz
The Center for Fundamental Physics (CFP) will provide an outstanding infrastructure for the cutting-edge research of the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU): The four-storey laboratory and office building (CFP II) with several research laboratories, a two-storey assembly hall and a conference area forms the above-ground counterpart to the conversion and extension of the underground experimental halls (CFP I), where the new electron accelerator MESA will be operated in the future.
In 2012, the PRISMA ("Precision Physics, Fundamental Interactions and Structure of Matter") Cluster of Excellence was approved as part of the Excellence Initiative, establishing a new research network in particle and hadron physics. The success story continued in the next round of the Excellence Strategy, and the successor Cluster PRISMA+ was launched in 2019. Nearly 300 scientists are currently working in the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence, which has achieved outstanding scientific success over the past decade.
"CFP II also houses special laboratories for detector development, including a clean room and a 400 square meter assembly hall for the construction of large detector components," explains Prof. Dr. Volker Büscher, professor at the Institute of Physics and construction manager of CFP II. The hall has a built-in crane system and a truck entrance for transporting the research equipment to large international research facilities such as CERN or to the underground MESA experimental hall at CFP I. "We now have ideal conditions for research and development in both buildings," adds Prof. Dr. Kurt Aulenbacher, professor at the Institute of Nuclear Physics, construction manager of CFP I and head of the project team for the construction of the new accelerator.
Technical and structural characteristics of the various buildings in the CFP
The challenge in building the underground experimental halls (CFP I) was to connect seamlessly to the existing experimental halls from the 1960s at a depth of up to 11 meters and to meet the structural requirements for accelerator operation. For example, 36 foundation piles with a diameter of 1.20 meters were sunk about 34 meters into the ground, and a 2.5 meter thick reinforced concrete ceiling for radiation protection was poured in one day.
On top of the 600 square meter hall, a two-storey technical building with an area of around 590 square meters was built above ground. Below ground, the new innovative particle accelerator MESA (Mainz Energy-Recovering Superconducting Accelerator) is currently being set up and put into operation. In addition, a new workshop with 290 square meters of office and recreation rooms and a 240 square meter warehouse have been made available for use by the institute.
The new CFP II laboratory and office building complements the expansion of the existing underground experimental halls. In terms of planning, the aim was to integrate CFP II into the very limited space between the existing nuclear physics buildings and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz. The new building, which is 56 meters long, 31 meters wide and 23 meters high, makes optimum use of the previous open space on Staudingerweg opposite the Institute of Physics. The groups involved in the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence are housed in the newly completed physics quarter in close proximity to each other.
CFP II houses offices and special laboratories for six new working groups from the research focus areas of neutrino physics, astroparticle physics, dark matter, precision physics at low energies and accelerator physics and the PRISMA detector laboratory, as well as for visiting scientists. There is also a multifunctional conference area for the Mainz Institute for Theoretical Physics (MITP) and office space for the administration of the Cluster of Excellence.
Cutting-edge research in Mainz – the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence
The PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence focuses on studying the fundamental building blocks of matter and the forces that act between them. The standard model of particle physics describes all of this with impressive accuracy – and yet leaves fundamental questions unanswered: Why did matter and antimatter not completely annihilate each other after the Big Bang? What does the invisible dark matter, which makes up more than 80 percent of the mass of the cosmos, consist of? What is the role of the mysterious neutrinos in the early universe? The search for this “new physics” beyond the standard model is the central theme of PRISMA+.
Scientific successes of the last ten years include the discovery of the Higgs particle and the measurement of the W boson mass at the ATLAS detector at CERN, the detection of a neutrino from a galaxy three billion light years away with the IceCube expression at the South Pole, the extremely precise measurement of muon magnetism at the American Fermilab, with which evidence of new physics is becoming extremely concentrated, and the continuous expansion of the XENON experiment, the world's most sensitive detector for the search for dark matter, in the Italian Gran Sasso mountains.