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Dr Keith Hamilton
Reader in Physics
Dept of Physics & Astronomy
Faculty of Maths & Physical Sciences
- Joined UCL
- 1st Apr 2012
Research summary
My research interests have been based around the development of Monte Carlo simulations for collider physics experiments, primarily the LHC. As a postdoctoral researcher I dedicated the great majority of my time to the construction of the Herwig++ event generator and, more recently, the Powheg-Box Monte Carlo tool-kit, focusing on high precision simulations. Both of these software packages are now being used in earnest by experimental collaborations at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) currently hunting for new elementary particles, such as the newly discovered Higgs boson.
In recent years, together with collaborators in Milan, I have been tackling some of the most technically and theoretically demanding research problems in this field. All of these developments are aimed at providing LHC analysts searching for new physics, sharper theoretical tools: firstly, to enable them to detect very faint new physics signals among the copious standard model physics backgrounds, and, secondly, to determine the nature of any such signal should it be detected. The main achievement in my research to date is the construction of the most accurate and flexible simulation of standard model Higgs boson production, in collaboration with colleagues in Milan and Oxford, to facilitate detailed analysis of its properties.
In the future these tools, and the calculational techniques they are based on, will continue to prove essential whatever else the LHC has in store.
Teaching summary
10/2013 - 1/2014 UCL, London.
Lecturer for Standard Model postgraduate course with Dr. M. Campanelli
7/2009 EU MCnet Research Training Network School, Lund University, Sweden.
Discussion leader and practical session leader.
9/2007 - 4/2009 Centre for Particle Physics Phenomenology, Louvain, Belgium.
Lecturer for Relativistic Quantum Mechanics with Prof. F. Maltoni.
9/2004 - 8/2007 Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology, Durham, England.
Undergraduate tutor.
9/2003 - 5/2004 Lady Margaret Hall, University of Oxford.
Junior lecturer: college teaching and assessment of 1st and 2nd year undergraduates with Prof. D. Andrews.
Education
- Institute of Education
- Other Postgraduate qualification (including professional), ATQ02 - Recognised by the HEA as an Associate Fellow | 2014
- University of Oxford
- Doctorate, Doctor of Philosophy | 2004
- University of Oxford
- Other higher degree, Master of Physics | 2000
Biography
Postdoctoral appointments
10/2011 - 7/2013 CERN Theoretical Physics Division.
9/2009 - 9/2011 Theoretical Physics Group, National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN), Sezione di Milano-Biccoca, Milan, Italy.
9/2007 - 9/2009 Centre for Particle Physics Phenomenology, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium.
9/2004 - 8/2007 Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology, University of Durham, England.
Education
10/2000 - 5/2004 DPhil High Energy Particle Physics, University of Oxford.
9/1996 - 6/2000 MPhys Theoretical & Particle Physics, University of Oxford.
9/1989 - 6/1996 Royal Belfast Academical Institution, Belfast, Northern Ireland.
