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Every 25 nanoseconds, the LHC will smash particles together to create new particles. We are not able to save the data from every single collision inside the CMS detector. Instead, we have a trigger system that picks only the most interesting events to save. One of the many inputs to the trigger is particle tracks. From the tracks, you are able to determine where the collisions happened and how much energy the new particles have. I am working on an algorithm that takes raw data and finds these tracks inside the CMS sub-detector called “Tracker”.

Sometimes I also work in the lab testing super fast electronics that send data through optical cables. There is a lot of data that has to be sent from the CMS detector to the systems that process the collision events. We need to make sure that the data is not lost or changed when we send it between systems. By testing the electronics and optical parts, we can find the best settings to avoid any loss of data.

There are many searches for new particles using the data from CMS. There are different theories that predict different particles. I am trying to find proof of a theory called “Supersymmetry”. Supersymmetry says that every particle that we have already found should have a partner particle. We have not found any partner particles yet…