PARTICLE PHYSICS
For the CMS experiment (2001-present) I have focused my research activities on Higgs physics and on searches for new phenomena, as well as on the development of advanced analysis tools for the calibration of the muon momentum scale (
MuScleFit), used in Higgs discovery analyses, the modeling of QCD backgrounds in multi-jet final states (
Hemisphere mixing), the investigation of multi-dimensional parameter space of new physics theories with unsupervised tools, and the anomaly detection approach to searches of new phenomena (
Inverse Bagging,
RanBox).
Selected publications:
Previously,
for the CDF experiment (1995-2012) I have contributed to the
top quark search and discovery and to the construction of the muon system upgrade of the CDF-II detector. I have produced the
first observation of Z->bb decays in hadron collisions, and developed a trigger for the calibration of b-quark jets using Z->bb decays.
Selected publications:
STATISTICS AND MACHINE LEARNING
Statistics
As a member (Sep 2009-present) and
chair (Jan 2012-Jul 2015) of the CMS Statistics Committee I have been ensuring the highest standards of statistical inference in data analysis for the publications of my experiment, advising the collaboration on best practice and performing the screening of ALL journal publications from the point of view of statistics technique and description.
Through the design and implementation of the AMVA4NewPhysics ITN project (see
below) I have brought Statisticians and Physicists together with the purpose of enabling a common language and addressing specific problems of HEP data analysis. I am fostering the interest of Statistics students in Padova toward HEP applications and studies, by offering theses and teaching particle physics at the Masters in Statistical Sciences.
Recent publications of relevance:
- L. Masserano et al., Simulation-Based Inference with WALDO: Perfectly Calibrated Confidence Regions Using Any Prediction or Posterior Estimation Algorithm, arXiv:2205.15680, June 2022.
- T. Dorigo et al., Deep Regression of Muon Energy with a K-Nearest Neighbor Algorithm, arXiv:2203.02841, March 2022.
- T. Dorigo et al., RanBox: Anomaly Detection in the Copula Space, arXiv:2106.05747[physics.data-an], June 2021.
- T. Dorigo, Extraordinary Claims: The 0.000029% Solution, EPJ Web Conf. 95 (2015) 02003.
- B. Scarpa and T. Dorigo, Bayesian Parametric Modeling of Higgs Pair Production, EPJ Web Conf. 137 (2017) 11011.
- A. Carvalho et al., Higgs Pair Production: Choosing Benchmarks with Cluster Analysis", arXiv:1507.02245, J. HEP 04 (2016) 126.
Machine Learning
I am involved in a number of studies of applications of machine learning techniques to particle physics applications,
as well as in the design of new techniques customized to the very special use cases provided by HEP and related research. These activities are in part the result of collaboration with the
darkmachines and the
GradHep collaborations, to which I belong, as well as the ETN networks
AMVA4NewPhysics and
INSIGHTS (see
below).
Recent publications of relevance:
- G. Strong et al., TomOpt: Differential optimisation for task- and constraint-aware design of particle detectors in the context of muon tomography
- T. Dorigo et al., Toward the end-to-end optimization of particle physics instruments with differentiable programming
- T. Dorigo et al., Toward the End-to-End Optimization of Particle Physics Instruments with Differentiable Programming: a White Paper, arxiv:2203.13818[physics.ins-det], 2022.
- T. Dorigo et al., Deep regression of Muon Energy with a K-Nearest Neighbor Algorithm, arXiv:2203.02841[hep-ex] (2022).
- J. Kieseler et al., Calorimetric Measurement of Multi-TeV Muons via Deep Regression, arXiv:2107.02119 (2021), EPJC 82 (2022), 82.
- A. Stakia et al., Advanced Multi-Variate Analysis for New Physics Searches at the LHC, arXiv:2105.07530, May 2021.
- P. de Castro Manzano and T. Dorigo, Dealing with Nuisance Parameters using Machine Learning in High Energy Physics: a Review, arXiv:2007.09121v2[stat.ML], to be published in "Artificial Intelligence for HEP".
- T. Dorigo, J. Kieseler, L. Layer, G. Strong, Muon Energy Measurement from Radiative Losses in a Calorimeter for a Collider Detector, arXiv:2008.10958[physics.ins-det] (2020).
- T. Dorigo, Geometry Optimization of a Muon-Electron Scattering Detector, arXiv:2002.09973, Physics Open 4 (2020) 100022.
- P. de Castro and T. Dorigo, INFERNO: Inference-Aware Neural Optimization, Comp. Phys. Comm. 244 (2019) 170.
- P. Vischia and T. Dorigo, The Inverse Bagging Algorithm: Anomaly Detection by Inverse Bootstrap Algorithm, EPJ Web Conf. 137 (2017) 11009.
THESIS OFFERS
The ones below are tentative titles of possible theses at laurea, masters, and PhD level. Contact me for more information
if you are interested, or to volunteer for a different one if it fits my research interests!
Ph. D. Thesis opportunities
Master Thesis opportunities
- Design optimization of detectors for muon tomography
- Optimization of hybrid calorimeters for future colliders
- Particle identification in granular calorimeters with deep learning
- Optimization of a ground array for gamma-ray detection
- Neuromorphic computing applications for detector design and optimization
- Optimization of in-ice and in-water arrays for neutrino detectors
Laurea Thesis opportunities
- Application of anomaly detection techniques to new physics searches with CMS
- Particle ID with deep learning in a highly granular detector
Present and past advisorship activities
In addition to the above, the following topics are currently being explored by students I am advising:
- Top quark cross section measurement optimization through systematics-aware classification (Dr. L. Layer, Ph.D. thesis)
- Search for the rare decay B-> tau tau with CMS B-parked Run-2 data (Dr. H. Yarar, Ph.D thesis)
- Optimization of calorimetry for future colliders (Dr. F.Nardi, in coll. with Prof. J. Donini, UCA)
And here is a list of 44 laurea and 11 Ph.D. students I am or have been an advisor of:
- Undegraduate and masters: M. Scardellato, G. Cortiana, E. Stocco, D. Frigo, M. Tosi, P. Vischia, A. Zavanella, M. Tosi, E. Moretti, D. Perizzolo, R. Casagrande, C. Favaro, P. Bortignon, P. Vischia, A. Zucchetta, D. Ceoldo, C. Gottardo, N. Riolfi, A. Balata, M. Migliorini, A. Casa, V. Fioroni, G. Delaini, M. Fumanelli, C. Maccani, H. Hanif, F. Chiandotto, M. Mojsovska, S. Tosato, B. dal Sasso, A. Demin, L. Quagliarella, A. Breccia, S. Yadav, S. Guglielmini, E. Arcolin, A. Bordignon, R. Lui, S. Yadav, E. Coradin, G. Celotto, J. Marino, S. de Vidi,
- Ph. D.: Dr. Giorgio Cortiana, Dr. Marco de Mattia, Dr. Mia Tosi, Dr. Luca Perrozzi, Dr. Alberto Zucchetta, Dr. Martino dall'Osso, Dr. Pablo de Castro Manzano, Dr. Hevjin Yarar, Dr. Lukas Layer, Dr. Federico Nardi, Dr. Awais Khan
CONFERENCE TALKS, SEMINARS AND COLLOQUIA
Selected conference talks
- "Artificial Intelligence for Physics Research", Vth USERN Congress, Tehran 2020.
- "From SU(3) to Three Quark Families", 8th ICNFP, Kolimpari 2019 (invited lecture at M. Gell-Mann memorial session).
- "Hadron Collider Searches for Diboson Resonances", 7th ICNFP, Kolimpari 2018 (invited plenary talk).
- "Hemisphere Mixing", EPS 2017, Venezia lido.
- "Recent Results of the CMS Experiment", 6th int. conference on HEP in the LHC era, Valparaiso 2016 (invited talk).
- "Standard Model Tests at the Tevatron", PASCOS, Imperial College, London 2007.
- "Searches for the Standard Model Higgs Boson at the Tevatron", Moriond QCD, La Thuile 2005.
- "Top Studies", Frontier Science 2002, Frascati 2002 (invited summary talk).
Selected colloquia and seminars at Universities and Research institutes
- "Sticking to the roots of machine learning", PhyStat Seminar, CERN 15 June 2022.
- "Fundamental Statistics for Discovery in Fundamental Physics", Physics Colloquium, Universite' Catholique de Louvain, 14 June 2018.
- "Fundamental Statistics for Discovery in Fundamental Physics", Oxford University, 24 April 2018.
- "Extraordinary Claims: The 0.000029% Solution", Physics Colloquium, Tel Aviv University, 1 January 2017.
- "Anomalies in Collider Data", Physics Colloquium, Northwestern University, 11 November 2016.
- "Status and Prospects of Higgs Searches at the Tevatron", Universidad de Valencia, 8 April 2010.
- "Anomalous multi-muon events in CDF", Universite' de Geneve, 20 March 2009.
- "Observation of Z Decays to b-Quark Pairs at the Tevatron Collider", Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 24 September 1998.
PUBLISHING AND ORGANIZATION OF CONFERENCES
Publishing
As an editor for two high-level peer-reviewed journals (
Reviews in Phyics and
Physics Open) for Elsevier Publishing co., I actively search for interesting review articles as well as innovative research papers - please
contact me if you are interested in publishing with us.
Conference organization
I have contributed as a member of local organizing committees, as session chair, or session convener to the organization of several conferences, workshops, and dissemination events in particle physics and related topics:
- European Physical Society Conference on HEP (Venezia Lido, Italy 2017), member of local organizing committee
- Quark Confinement and the Hadron Spectrum: ideator and chair of session on "Statistical Methods for Physics Analysis in the XXI Century" (2016-present); member of local organizing committee, 2016.
- International conference on New Frontiers in Physics (2014-present), organizer of parallel sessions, organizer of social events, chair of plenary sessions
- INFN School of Statistics (2013-present), member of scientific organizing committee
- Darkmachines collaboration workshops (2018-present), member of organizing committee, chair of sessions
- International Workshop on Advanced Computing and Analysis Techniques in Physics Research (Saas-Fee, 2019), chair of parallel session
- MODE Workshop on differentiable programming for fundamental physics: member of organizing committee (2021-).
REVIEWS AND REFEREEING
Reviews
I have peer-reviewed scientific publications for the following journals and publishers: Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A, Computer Physics Communications, Journal of Instrumentation, Physics Math Central A, The Review of Particle Properties, Il Nuovo Cimento, International Journal of Modern Physics A, Computing and Software for Big Science, Progress of Particle and Nuclear Physics, MDPI Instruments, MDPI Symmetry, SciPost, Physica Scripta, NeurIPS, Nature Communications, Springer Nature, Physics Review D, JHEP, Reviews in Modern Physics, Princeton Press, Physical Review Letters, LHEP, Machine Learning in Science and Technology, Nature Physics, Annals of Geophysics, Princeton Univ. Press, EPJC
Refereeing
I have reviewed grant proposals for INFN (Italy), the NWO and the FOM (the Netherlands), the STFC and the Royal Society (Great Britain), the QNRF (Qatar), the HSE (Russia), the European Community Horizon 2020 program (ITN and ERC), and the ANR and CNRS (France). In addition, I am currently a referee of the BES III and MUonE experiments for INFN.
Advisory
I am a member of the Advisory Board of the
EC-funded SilentBorder project, and of the advisory board of the
USERN organization. I am also a member of the
Editorial Board of "MDPI Particles" journal.
Prizes
I have selected researchers for prizes awarded by
INFN, the
USERN organization, the
International Data Analysis Olympiad, and the
CMS experiment
OUTREACH ACTIVITIES
My outreach activity is intense and multi-pronged:
I have also organized and/or given presentations at over 30 public conferences, high-school lectures, and outreach events. Below I list a short selection of such events.
- Invited talk ("Communicating discoveries in the blog era") and panel discussion on "Blogs, Big Physics and Breaking News" at the World Conference of Science Journalists, London 2009
(with Matthew Chalmers and James Gillies, see a summary by M. Durrani on Physics World here )
- Invited talk "Universe Dissectors" at TED-X Flanders, Antwerp 2011 (with Peter Woit, see video on YouTube).
- Invited guest to the talk show "Il vaso di Pandora" ("Istruzione tradizionale o valorizzazione dei talenti?" - see YouTube video) for the TeleChiara network, 2016 (with Paola Zocca).
- Public lecture at Festivaletteratura 2018 Mantova on "Scienza e societa'" (with Massimiano Bucchi).
- Panel discussion on "Artificial Intelligence: past, present and future" at DESY, Hamburg (7 July 2019, with Pierre Baldi, Andrey Ustyuzhanin, Glen Cowan).
COLLABORATION AND NETWORKING
Besides participating in the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC (and previously in the CDF experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron collider), I am involved in the following collaborative endeavours:
- MODE, an international collaboration of physicists and computer scientists developing differentiable programming tools for the end-to-end optimization of the design of particle physics detectors
- DarkMachines, an international collaboration of over 100 astronomers, physicists, astrophysicists and computer scientists developing machine learning tools for dark matter searches
- GradHep, a small group of physicists and computer scientists developing differentiable programming tools for the optimization of physics measurement
- ML-INFN, a project for an end-to-end use of machine learning for INFN research
- SWGO, an ultra-high-energy Gamma Ray ground-based detector
In addition, I am or have been involved in the following EC-funded projects:
- as Scientific Coordinator and PI of the INFN node for the AMVA4NewPhysics network, an ETN focusing on machine learning developments for HEP research (2014-2019)
- as PI of the INFN-Padova node and Outreach Coordinator for the INSIGHTS network, an ETN focusing on statistics and machine learning advancements for scientific research (2017-present)
- as a member of iMPACT, an ERC-Consolidator granted project on a fast device for proton therapy led by Prof. P. Giubilato (Univ. Padova)