Associate Professor
About
Professor Penning’s group is working on direct DM searches with the LUX-Zeplin (LZ) experiment and on future detectors for low mass dark matter. His group is involved in the design, construction, and operation of the LZ Outer Detector, an active shield to reduce the main background of dark matter searches. Professor Penning’s group is also developing new detectors for low mass dark matter searches. Using phenomenological research Professor Penning also studies how to improve the understanding of dark matter and optimize DM searches.
In the past Professor Penning also worked on the CMS, ATLAS, and D0 experiments. He performed first dark matter searches on the LHC, precision measurements in electroweak physics, the first experimental Higgs boson exclusion at a hadron collider, and was working on the first evidence of the decay of the Higgs boson to b-quarks. He also worked in the areas of calorimetry, tracking, and triggering.
Selected Publications:
Measurement of the Gamma Ray Background in the Davis Cavern at the Sanford Underground Research Facility, LZ collaboration, Astropart. Phys. 116, 102391, arXiv:1904.02112 (2020).
Opening the Energy Window on Direct Dark Matter Detection, B. Penning, et al, JCAP (12):013-013, arXiv:1810.05576 (2018).
Projected WIMP Sensitivity of the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) Dark Matter Experiment, LZ Collaboration, Phys. Rev. D 101, 052002, arXiv:1802.06039 (2018).
LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) Technical Design Report, LZ Collaboration, LBNL-1007256, arXiv:1703.09144 (2017).
The Pursuit of Dark Matter at Collider - An Overview, B. Penning, J. Phys. G 45(6):063001 (2018).
Hunting the Dark Higgs, B. Penning, et al, JHEP 1704 143, arXiv:1701.08780, (2017).
An Inclusive Search for New Phenomena in Final States with One or More Jets and Missing Transverse Momentum at 13 TeV with the AlphaT Variable, CMS Collaboration, Eur. Phys. J. C 77(5):294, arXiv:1611.003388 (2017).
Search For New Phenomena in Final States with an Energetic Jet and Large Missing Transverse Momentum in pp collisions at√s= 8TeV with the ATLAS Detector, ATLAS Collaboration, Eur. Phys. J. C 75, 299, arXiv:1502.01518 (2015).
Evidence for a Particle Produced in Association with Weak Bosons and Decaying to a Bottom-Antibottom Quark Pair in Higgs Boson Searches at the Tevatron, D0 Collaboration, Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 071804, arXiv:1207.6436, PRL Editor’s Suggestion and Physics Viewpoint article (2012).
Combination of Tevatron Searches for the Standard Model Higgs Boson, D0 Collaboration, Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 061802, arXiv:1001.4162, PRL Editors’ Suggestion, PRL Cover, Physics’ Viewpoint article (2010).
