Professor Simon Viel, Department of Physics

Postdocs and Students

Postdoctoral fellow postion open

I am looking to hire a new postdoctoral fellow, to join the nEXO experiment. More details are available here on INSPIRE. Please contact me with any question, and to apply.

New students

My group's research is based at Carleton University. Possible projects include:

  • Search for dark matter with DEAP-3600: data analysis and operation
  • Simulation and expected performance of future liquid-argon detectors looking for dark matter: DarkSide-20k and ARGO with the Global Argon Dark Matter Collaboration
  • Cryogenic silicon photomultiplier detector research and development, including for nEXO

Prospective graduate students, please read the Department of Physics recruitment page for information on programs, admission requirements, the application process, funding and awards.

International students: Due to funding policies, I am only able to consider non-Canadian applications into the PhD program, from candidates who already have an MSc in Physics. Applicants who already have a PhD in Physics are invited to apply to positions at the postdoctoral level.

More information can be found here for undergraduates:

Please don't hesitate to contact me for more details. Email is the best way to contact me these days.

Current research team

Matt Dunford, Postdoctoral Fellow (2022-) Profile Picture of Matt Dunford

Matt completed his PhD in 2018 with DEAP-3600 at Carleton University, focusing on measuring the specific activity of 39Ar and searching for the theoretical neutrinoless double electron capture of 36Ar. Prior to working with DEAP he worked on the construction and commissioning of a xenon gas TPC with the EXO-200 collaboration. After his PhD he worked with the ATLAS collaboration on the New Small Wheel hardware upgrade, and has now returned to DEAP to continue measurements of argon isotope properties.
He is the current Run Coordinator for DEAP-3600.

Akhil Maru, Doctoral Student (2022-) Profile Picture of Akhil Maru

Akhil is a PhD student in Particle Physics at Carleton University. He analyzes data from the DEAP-3600 experiment to measure the muon flux at SNOLAB, and participates in testing SiPM-based detectors with the Argon-1 cryostat in the COLD Lab facility. Before coming to Canada, Akhil completed his MSc in Astro and Particle Physics at the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Germany. His MSc thesis was based on transition measurement techniques of Tungsten Transition-Edge Sensors with the help of 3He-4He dilution refrigerators.

Spencer Haskins, Doctoral Student (2021-) Profile Picture of Spencer Haskins

Spencer is a PhD student in Particle Physics at Carleton University. He is working with the DEAP-3600 experiment in the data analysis group, with a focus on improving position reconstruction and event identification using machine learning applied to the search for dark matter.

Trevor Hoyte, Honours Thesis Student (2020-2021), Research Assistant (2023-2024) Profile Picture of Trevor Hoyte

Trevor obtained his undergraduate degree as a student athlete at Carleton University. His past research included tumor tracking with 4DCBCT as well as top quark tagging using machine learning. His Honours thesis in Physics in the Astrophysics stream involved the search for solar neutrino absorption in DEAP-3600. Now a professional football player, during the CFL off-season he came back to make further contributions to this neutrino search analysis.

M. Andrés Bigentini, Honours Thesis Student (2023-2024)

Andrés is an undergraduate student in Astrophysics at Carleton University. Interested in pursuing a career in astronomy, cosmology, or particle physics, he also enjoys learning languages, reading manga and going on walks.
He is working on improving a machine learning algorithm for event identification and position reconstruction in DEAP-3600.

Past postdocs

Roxanne Turcotte-Tardif, Postdoctoral Fellow (2023) Profile Picture of Roxanne Turcotte-Tardif

Roxanne completed her PhD in 2022 at the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology (KIT) in Germany within the IceCube Neutrino Observatory Collaboration. The scope of her thesis was the development of a hybrid prototype station for the detection of cosmic rays at the South Pole, with a focus on radio detection technologies and the first analyses of data from the prototype station. Before this, Roxanne worked on the development of acoustic sensors for the next-generation optical module for the upgrade of IceCube. With DEAP-3600, she worked on data analyses and detector hardware upgrades at SNOLAB. Roxanne moved on to a career in the private sector.

Guillaume Oliviéro, Postdoctoral Fellow (2019-2021) Profile Picture of Dr. Guillaume Oliviéro

Guillaume completed is PhD at the University of Caen, Normandie in France. His thesis subject was on the design and implementation of the trigger system for the demonstrator module of the SuperNEMO experiment looking for neutrinoless double beta decay. At Carleton University he was a major contributor to the core analysis software for the dark matter search with DEAP-3600, in leadership roles as Software Coordinator, as Data Processing and PMT analysis group convener, and as Backgrounds group convener. Guillaume then became a postdoc at University College London.

Damian Goeldi, Postdoctoral Fellow (2018-2020) Profile Picture of Dr. Damian Goeldi

Damian did his PhD at the University of Bern, Switzerland on the research and development of liquid argon time projection chamber neutrino detectors. At Carleton he worked on DEAP-3600 data analysis and nEXO R&D.
"I love tinkering in the lab, which is why I'm currently testing new photosensors for future noble liquid dark matter and neutrino experiments."
Damian went on to a postdoc position at ETH Zurich.

Past graduate students

Bindiya Chana, Doctoral Student (2018-2023) Profile Picture of Bindiya Chana

Bindiya completed her PhD in Particle Physics at Carleton University. She worked within the nEXO collaboration on the EXO-100 and Light-only Liquid Xenon prototype systems, to carry out R&D with high-voltage and SiPMs in liquid xenon toward their large-scale applications in the nEXO experiment. She is an expert in the development of detector simulations informed by data. Bindiya is now employed as a physicist at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories.

Phillip DelGobbo, Master's Student (2019-2021) Profile Picture of Phillip DelGobbo

Phillip completed his MSc in Particle Physics at Carleton University, working with the DEAP-3600 experiment in the analysis group. He measured the rates of attenuated alpha backgrounds in the detector, and optimized signal acceptance and background rejection for the WIMP dark matter search. Phillip moved on to a career in financial data analysis.

Timothée Cabos, Master's Internship Student (2021)

Timothée carried out a 3-month research internship at Carleton University, as part of his Master's degree at the Université de Montpellier. He worked on the neural-network approach to position reconstruction for DEAP-3600.

Past undergraduate students

Jacqueline Hollstedt, Honours Thesis Student (2022-2023) Profile Picture of Jacqueline Hollstedt

Jacqueline graduated in Physics (Astrophysics stream) at Carleton University. She has a wide range of interests including karate and music theory with its applications in therapy, but has always been fascinated by how things work, and everything related to space for as long as she can remember. For her Honours thesis, she trained a neural network and evaluated its performance for position reconstruction based on simulation of the proposed ARGO dark matter detector.

May Wittenberg, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2022) Profile Picture of May Wittenberg

May is an undergraduate student at Carleton University pursuing a degree in Astrophysics. She is interested in a variety of space-related fields, including astronomy and astroparticle physics, particularly in the pursuit of dark matter. She improved the event selection for dark matter in DEAP-3600.

Raveen Sidhu, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2021) Profile Picture of Raveen Sidhu

Raveen was an undergraduate student at the University of British Columbia, majoring in microbiology and oceanography. In summer 2021 she worked at the intersection of data science and astroparticle physics, using artificial intelligence for position reconstruction with DEAP-3600.

Kevin Gracequist, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2018, 2020-2021) Profile Picture of Kevin Gracequist

Kevin completed a BEng in Engineering Physics at Carleton University. He is interested in various physics phenomena, such as the nature of dark matter, the search for long lived particles, and neutrinos. In 2018, he simulated crystals of tetraphenyl butadiene on the inner detector surface of DEAP-3600. In 2020-2021, he implemented GEANT4 simulations of the multi-hundred-tonnes next-generation detector ARGO.

Owen Darragh, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2020-2021)

Owen was an undergraduate student in Physics (Astrophysics stream) at Carleton University. He performed validation studies of DEAP-3600 detector simulations. Owen is the host of The Quantum Mic podcast.

Jiapeng Zhang, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2020-2021)

Jiapeng was an undergraduate student in Physics (Astrophysics stream) at Carleton University. He studied alpha decays from dust particulates in DEAP-3600.

Emily Darling, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2020) Profile Picture of Emily Darling

Emily was an undergraduate student at Queen's University, majoring in Geology and minoring in Physics. Her work involved characterizing the muon flux at DEAP-3600 and studying how it modulates in response to atmospheric changes.

Waqar Muhammad, Research Assistant (2018-2019) Profile Picture of Waqar Muhammad

Waqar graduated in Physics from Carleton University. In his work with the DEAP-3600 collaboration, he developed code for data analysis and low-level data processing, position reconstruction and background discrimination with machine learning. He now works as a data scientist in the financial sector.

Jérémie LePage-Bourbonnais, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2019)

In 2019, Jérémie carried out position reconstruction studies for DEAP-3600: he reviewed and improved reconstruction algorithms, and characterized the flow of liquid argon in the detector.

James Hughes, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2019)

In co-supervision with Prof. Razvan Gornea, James designed electronic printed circuit boards to read out analog silicon photomultipliers.

Michael Sloan, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2019)

Michael validated the alpha background model of DEAP-3600, and improved simulations of alpha decays from dust particulates.

Adam Smith-Orlik, Undergraduate Research Assistant (2019)

Adam improved the time profile of simulated 39Ar beta decays in DEAP-3600. His presentation at the Canadian Undergraduate Physics Conference in 2020 won the Nuclear and Particle category award.

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