Resource-aware Research on Universe and Matter: Call-to-Action in Digital Transformation

Given the urgency to reduce fossil fuel energy production to make climate tipping points less likely, we call for resource-aware knowledge gain in the research areas on Universe and Matter with emphasis on the digital transformation. A portfolio of measures is described in detail and then summarized according to the timescales required for their implementation. The measures will both contribute to sustainable research and accelerate scientific progress through increased awareness of resource usage. This work is based on a three-days workshop on sustainability in digital transformation held in May 2023.Comment: 20 pages, 2 figures, publication following workshop 'Sustainability in the Digital Transformation of Basic Research on Universe & Matter', 30 May to 2 June 2023, Meinerzhagen, Germany, https://indico.desy.de/event/3748

The COVID-19 pandemic and its global effects on dental practice : An International survey

Objectives: A multicentre survey was designed to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 outbreak on dental practice worldwide, estimate the COVID-19 related symptoms/signs, work attitudes and behaviour and the routine use of protective measures and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). Methods: A global survey using a standardized questionnaire with research groups from 36 countries was designed. The questionnaire was developed and pretested during April 2020 and contained three domains: 1) Personal data; 2) COVID-19 positive rate and symptoms/signs presumably related to the coronavirus; 3) Working conditions and PPE adopted after the outbreak. Countries' data were grouped by the Country Positive Rate (CPR) during the survey period and by Gross-National-Income per capita. An ordinal multinomial logistic regression model was carried out with COVID-19 self-reported rate referred by dental professionals as dependent variable to assess the association with questionnaire items. Results: A total of 52,491 questionnaires were returned with a male/female ratio of 0.63. Out of the total respondents, 7,859 dental professionals (15%) reported symptoms/signs compatible with COVID-19. More than half of the sample (n = 27,818; 53%) stated to use FFP2/N95 masks, while 21,558 (41.07%) used eye protection. In the bivariate analysis, CPR and N95/FFP2 were significantly associated (OR = 1.80 95% =5.20 95% 95% CI = 1.60/2.82 and OR CI = 1.44/18.80, respectively), while Gross-National-Income was not statistically associated with CPR (OR = 1.09 CI = 0.97/1.60). The same significant associations were observed in the multivariate analysis. Conclusions: Oral health service provision has not been significantly affected by COVID-19, although access to routine dental care was reduced due to country-specific temporary lockdown periods. While the dental profession has been identified at high-risk, the reported rates of COVID-19 for dental professionals were not significantly different to those reported for the general population in each country. These findings may help to better plan oral health care for future pandemic events

The COVID-19 pandemic and its global effects on dental practice. An international survey

Objectives A multicentre survey was designed to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 outbreak on dental practice worldwide, estimate the COVID-19 related symptoms/signs, work attitudes and behaviour and the routine use of protective measures and personal protective equipment (PPE). Methods A global survey using a standardized questionnaire with research groups from 36 countries was designed. The questionnaire was developed and pretested during April 2020 and contained three domains: 1) personal data; 2) COVID-19 positive rate and symptoms/signs presumably related to the coronavirus; 3) working conditions and PPE adopted after the outbreak. Countries’ data were grouped by the country positive rate (CPR) during the survey period and by Gross-National-Income per capita. An ordinal multinomial logistic regression model was carried out with COVID-19 self-reported rate referred by dental professionals as dependent variable to assess the association with questionnaire items. Results A total of 52,491 questionnaires were returned with a male/female ratio of 0.63. Out of the total respondents, 7,859 dental professionals (15%) reported symptoms/signs compatible with COVID-19. More than half of the sample (n=27,818; 53%) stated to use FFP2/N95 masks, while 21,558 (41.07%) used eye protection. In the bivariate analysis, CPR and N95/FFP2 were significantly associated (OR=1.80 95%CI=1.60/2.82 and OR=5.20 95%CI=1.44/18.80, respectively), while Gross-National-Income was not statistically associated with CPR (OR=1.09 95%CI=0.97/1.60). The same significant associations were observed in the multivariate analysis. Conclusions Oral health service provision has not been significantly affected by COVID-19, although access to routine dental care was reduced due to country-specific temporary lockdown periods. While the dental profession has been identified at high-risk, the reported rates of COVID-19 for dental professionals were not significantly different to those reported for the general population in each country. These findings may help to better plan oral health care for future pandemic events

Searches for dark matter and single top-quarks with the ATLAS experiment

Dark matter (DM) remains one of the unrevealed mysteries of the universe. Even though it constitutes ∼ 85% of the matter, considerably little is known about DM, despite its significant influence on the dynamics of galaxies and the expansion of the universe. The search for DM at colliders marks an important pillar in exploring all possible realisations of DM. A search for DM particles with the ATLAS experiment at the LHC is presented in this thesis. The full run-II dataset of sqrt(s) = 13 TeV proton-proton collisions with an integrated luminosity of 139 fb-1 collected from 2015 to 2018 is used. A model with an extended Higgs-sector is probed in the search. In this 2HDM+a model, a second Higgs doublet, a pseudo-scalar DM mediator and a fermionic DM particle are added to the Standard Model of particle physics (SM). DM particles produced in association with a top-quark and a W -boson are searched for. The top-quark decays into a W-boson and a b-quark. This gives a total of two W-bosons in signal events. Both of these can decay into quarks or leptons. Depending on the decays of the W-bosons, the final state of this search is characterised by zero, one or two charged leptons. Three analysis channels are defined according to the charged lepton multiplicity and referred to as 0L, 1L and 2L channel. The search presented in this thesis focusses on the 1L channel. In addition, all final states are statistically combined to provide the most stringent exclusion limits in terms of 2HDM+a model based DM models. The 1L channel exploits that one of the W-bosons can, if decaying hadronically and having a relatively high-pT, be reconstructed in a large-radius jet and be identified using a procedure called W-tagging. This significantly increases the signal-to-background ratio. Selected events must have high missing transverse momentum due to the elusive nature of DM particles and at least one b-tagged small-radius jet. Consistency between the SM prediction and the data is observed and exclusion limits at 95 % CL on the normalisation of BSM signals are derived. The analysis of the full run-II dataset and the statistical combination of all final states constrain large areas of the parameter space. Masses ma up to 400 GeV as well as masses mH± below 300 GeV and beyond 2000 GeV and values of tan β up to 2.2 are excluded. Interesting opportunities to further explore challenging corners of the parameter space arise, e.g. extending the sensitivity at high values of tan β

Mono-X searches in ATLAS and CMS

Mono-X searches in ATLAS and CMS Contribution to LHCP202

Resource-aware Research on Universe and Matter: Call-to-Action in Digital Transformation

Given the urgency to reduce fossil fuel energy production to make climate tipping points less likely, we call for resource-aware knowledge gain in the research areas on Universe and Matter with emphasis on the digital transformation. A portfolio of measures is described in detail and then summarized according to the timescales required for their implementation. The measures will both contribute to sustainable research and accelerate scientific progress through increased awareness of resource usage. This work is based on a three-days workshop on sustainability in digital transformation held in May 2023