PARTICLE PHYSICS

DESY has a new research director for particle physics: Ulrich Husemann, formerly professor at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), assumes the position on 1 November. DESY is familiar territory for the particle physicist: Husemann worked on DESY experiments during his diplom and doctoral theses, was a junior research group leader in Zeuthen and most recently a member of the Physics Advisory Committee (PRC). Following the appointment of his predecessor Beate Heinemann as Chair of the Board of Directors in March, Ties Behnke, senior scientist at DESY, had been acting as interim head of the research division.

"Ulrich Husemann not only has a broad background in particle physics, but also knows the German and international research landscape inside out. I couldn’t imagine a better successor, and I look forward to hearing his ideas and working with him," says Beate Heinemann, Chair of the DESY Board of Directors. "My special thanks go to Ties Behnke, who has led the department for a second time on an interim basis with his broad expertise."

Husemann first came to the DESY campus in Hamburg as a graduate student. As a student at TU Dortmund University, he was involved in the HERA-B experiment at DESY's HERA accelerator, which was still in operation at the time. After graduating, his professor in Dortmund seconded him to Hamburg between 2001 and 2003 as his ‘man on the experiment’ and expert on the muon pretrigger and the RICH multiplicity veto. "At HERA-B, we were able to do a lot ourselves – I even brought some electronic boards with me on the train from Dortmund," says Husemann. After his professor moved to Siegen, he completed his doctorate there and also gained his first experience in teaching. In order to continue working on an ongoing experiment, he went to the United States as a postdoc and, while working on the CDF experiment at Fermilab near Chicago, also became an expert in silicon detectors and top quark physics.

Equipped with this expertise, he returned to DESY in 2008 as a junior research group leader in the ATLAS group in Zeuthen, where he worked in cooperation with Humboldt University of Berlin to prepare for the upgrade of the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN near Geneva. "It was an exciting time because the LHC was just starting up and we “rediscovered” the top quark with the first collision data," says Husemann. In 2011, he was appointed professor at KIT and switched to the CMS experiment at the LHC. KIT is also part of the Helmholtz Association, which provided him with the ideal preparation for the directorship. Thanks to his role in the DESY-PRC, which he held from 2019 to 2024, he is also very familiar with the physics programme currently underway at DESY. In addition, as one of Germany's representatives for the update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics, he is actively involved in shaping the international physics research landscape of the future.

The Board of Directors also includes Beate Heinemann, Wim Leemans, Britta Redlich, Christian Stegmann and Iris Wilhelm. "The team has changed a lot in recent years; the many new directors bring a great dynamic and I look forward to working with the Board of Directors and the excellent staff at DESY," says Husemann. He is responsible for particle physics research and IT at DESY and already has ideas and plans for the future. "DESY is an outstanding research centre and offers lots of opportunities for the future, whether locally with the clusters of excellence and the Science City, nationally with Helmholtz and BMFTR, or internationally with research centres such as CERN. As a national research centre, DESY plays a special role as a mediator for future major international projects in cooperation with research groups at German universities, and I would like to expand this role." Husemann also wants to strengthen his personal area of expertise at DESY: in cooperation with other Helmholtz centres, he plans to expand DESY as a technology centre for detectors and microelectronics of the latest generation – including quantum sensors. "We need to position ourselves broadly with an attractive programme at the DESY sites and participation in major international projects. This will ensure that we are definitely involved in the exciting physics developments of the future."

In addition, the new Research Director has made it his mission to develop stable career paths in the technical and scientific fields. He is also keen to improve the image of fundamental research among the general public: his aim is to reach not only research enthusiasts, but also people who are not particularly interested in research and technology.

When he is not teaching, researching or sitting on committees, Husemann enjoys sports: he is a passionate cyclist and has been a regular runner since his PhD days in Hamburg. And if there is a big band, funk or soul combo in Hamburg and the surrounding area looking for a tenor saxophonist, the new research director could be their man.