Mary Slipper

People sat in rows a committee hearing - all smartly dressed

Here is my run-down of today's Science and Technology Committee hearing (House of Lords) where "considerable disquiet in the science community" was raised with Sir Patrick Vallance. Really great to see the public gallery packed with physicists!

Top academics warn UK physics cuts threaten effort to boost economy More than 50 heads of departments tell science minister that changes risk undermining crucial tech growth fields

UKRI funding changes are raising serious concern across the UK science community. More than 50 university physics leaders including all 23 Russell Group universities with physics facilities have warned that proposed cuts risk undermining innovation-led economic growth.
🔗 www.ft.com/content/a235...

Today marks the first day of meteorological spring 🌷

March has arrived, and with it comes longer, lighter days. Over the next few weeks most of us will enjoy around two extra hours of daylight ☀️

STFC CEO responds to @jonbutterworth.bsky.social

"it is important for all of our ... programmes ... to contribute to us making savings across our entire portfolio"

No mention that *all* is disproportionately falling on the particle-astro-nuclear programme 🤷‍♀️😡

www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

God willing

✨ Today, 11 February, we mark the #InternationalDayofWomenandGirlsinScience and, at the same time, the #InternationalMasterclasses 2026 officially begin.
✨ Enjoy and don't forget to share your stories and photo tagging us!
ATLAS Experiment CMS Experiment at CERN LHCb Experiment

CERN upgrade to LHCb experiment threatened by UK funding cuts – Physics World Upgrade to the UK-led project is unlikely to go ahead if UK funding cuts are not reversed

Article from @physicsworld.bsky.social about the decision to withdraw UK funding from the @lhcb.bsky.social upgrade, without which LHCb will not be able to exploit the high luminosity LHC (which the UK has already paid for via the CERN subscription).

physicsworld.com/a/cern-upgra...

UK ‘could lose generation of scientists’ with cuts to projects and research facilities Researchers say best scientists are taking posts overseas because of lack of job stability at home

Glad to see pushback picking up in the media about the proposed massive cuts to UK particle/astro/nuclear physics 🧪🔭. Everyone understands that tough choices have to be made, but not investing in your future is a surefire way of, well, not having much of one 🤷‍♀️

www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

🔊 Calling UK early career researches in astro, particle & nuclear physics. Please sign this open response to the proposed cuts at STFC ⚛️🧪🔭

"Protecting the UK's reputation as a science superpower requires not only investment, but continuity, confidence, and people"

✍️ ecr-openletter-stfc.github.io

“The combined tuition fees of the entire Question Time panel would not cover my cost for 1 year of uni. Is that fair?”
Oli Dugmore

It’s absolutely NOT fair. This outrageous scandal must end

Inclusive B-meson flavour-tagging algorithm at LHCb arxiv.org/abs/2508.20180 - This new algorithm improves the tagging power by 35% for B0 mesons and 20% for B0s mesons when compared to the combined performance of the existing LHCb flavour-tagging algorithms.

Search for the decay B⁰→ϕϕ arxiv.org/abs/2507.20945 - No significant signal is observed, and an upper limit on the branching fraction of 1.3 (1.4)×10⁻⁸ at 90 (95)% confidence level is set.

Cat or Particle Physics Experiment Do you know whether it's the name of the cat shown or of a particle physics experiment? Quiz made by William Barter, using cat photos provided by colleagues in the University of Edinburgh PPE group.

Is it the name of a cat or the name of a particle physics experiment?
forms.gle/f3mGxKjt6jAe...

I agree - I much prefer saying I work on beauty quarks! It sounds so special (But out of habit I do still say ‘top’!)

Thank you! ☺️ I hope so too!

Always good to be back at CERN! This time for the @lhcb.bsky.social collaboration week!

How lovely! I hope she is enjoying it

Hah! I haven’t heard that one!

Thank you! 😁

Thank you!

Thank you! Reverse-acronym? What am I missing…

Thank you, Franz. I will miss being part of the group!

Congratulations to @sliippr.bsky.social, who successfully passed her PhD viva yesterday!

Thank you! :D

I’m a Dr now!

Instructions: “dig a 20cm square hole, 40cm deep, and fill with concrete”

Me, a woman in STEM:

A fantastic group to have been part of!

Up to three postdoctoral positions are available in our group @edinburghppe.bsky.social working on the LHCb experiment @lhcb.bsky.social #hep-jobs.
Feel free to contact us directly, if you have questions
and apply at tinyurl.com/5f4ahk2p

Newnham college, Cambridge :)

𝗪𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗲 𝗖𝗣 𝘃𝗶𝗼𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝗯𝗮𝗿𝘆𝗼𝗻𝘀!

Today the LHCb collaboration posted a #preprint on the first observation of CP violation in baryons. What's the matter?

Spoiler alert: contains bananas 🍌

#thread below