Antonio Ereditato
Director of the Laboratory for High Energy Physics (LHEP) and of the Albert Einstein Center for Fundamental physics (AEC) at the University of Bern
Born (1955-06-02) 2 June 1955 (age 69)
NationalityItalian
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics (Particle physics)


Antonio Ereditato, (Naples, 2 June, 1955) is an experimental particle physicist. Since 2006 he is full professor of elementary particle physics and director of the Laboratory for High Energy Physics (LHEP) at the University of Bern[1]. Since 2011 he is also director of the Albert Einstein Center for Fundamental physics (AEC), which is one of the most important academic institutions in Switzerland involved in the theoretical and experimental study of particle physics.

Early life and education

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Antonio Ereditato graduated in physics at the University Federico II, Naples in 1981, obtaining a “Laurea” Magna cum laude. He continued his studies there and in 1985 he was awarded the Prize Italian Physical Society (SIF) for Young Researchers in Trieste. He achieved his PhD at the University Federico II in 1987, with a thesis on the measurement of the electroweak mixing angle by neutrino interactions.

Professional record

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  • CERN Scientific Associate since 1981
  • Visiting Researcher IN2P3, Centre de Recherches Nucléaires (CRN), Strasbourg, 1982-1983
  • PhD Fellowship at the Federico II University, Napoli, 1983-1986
  • Fellowship at the Experimental Physics Division, CERN Geneva, 1985-1988
  • Researcher at INFN Napoli, since June 1988 (permanent position)
  • Senior Researcher at INFN Napoli, since November 1990 (permanent position)
  • Paid Scientific Associate, CERN Geneva (on leave of absence from INFN), 1993-1994
  • Fellowship of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Nagoya, 1996
  • Director of Research at INFN Napoli, 1998-2005 (permanent position)
  • Full Professor of Experimental Particle Physics at the University of Bern, since March 2006 (present position)

Research activities

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Antonio Ereditato has carried out research activities in the field of weak and strong interaction, in particular in neutrino physics, with experiments at CERN, in Japan, in the U.S.A. and at the Gran Sasso laboratory. He is involved with numerous research projects on the development of particle detectors: wire chambers, calorimeters, Time Projection Chambers, nuclear emulsions, detectors for medical applications[2]. The research activities of Ereditato presently include the ATLAS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider LHC, which in 2012 discovered the Higgs boson[3], together with the experiment CMS, the T2K experiment in Japan, which in 2013 discovered the appearance of neutrino oscillation[4], the MicroBooNE and SBND experiments at Fermilab, both aimed at the the search of sterile neutrinos, and the AEGIS experiment at the CERN antiproton Decelerator, which purpose is the measurement of the gravity acceleration for neutral antimatter (anti-hydrogen)[5]. The research group of Antonio Ereditato is leader in the study and development of argon liquid detectors, the so called Time Projection Chambers (TPC). The group of Bern achieved the world record for the length of drift with these TPC (> 5 m): an important result in view of the realization of the next generation of underground observers for neutrinos[6]. Moreover, Ereditato and collaborators are developing a new generation of detectors with nuclear emulsions and automatic microscopes for their analysis, which shall be useful in various applications of fundamental and applied physics[7],[8] . Antonio Ereditato has recently contributed to create a research laboratory in collaboration with the University Hospital of Bern centered on a medical cyclotron and on its extracted beam line, an infrastructure almost unique in Europe among the cyclotrons for medical use.

Main scientific achievements

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  • Responsible for a specific trigger for tri-muon search (B meson decay) in the CERN NA10 experiment and related physics analysis. Main author of the final publication.
  • Responsible for the installation, operation and calibration of the streamer tube calorimeter of the CERN CHARM II experiment. Main author of analyses on the calorimeter performance.
  • Measurement of the Weinberg angle in muon neutrino – electron interactions.
  • Initiative to contribute with an INFN Napoli group to the CERN SPACAL project and to the follow up RD1 experiment. World record energy resolution for hadronic calorimeters.
  • Co-promoter of the CALOR Conference series (1991 → today)
  • Proponent of R&D studies on new liquid scintillator calorimeters (FORWARD) and trackers (ACTAR).
  • Proposal of using a lead-fiber calorimeter in the CHORUS experiment. Later appointed Project Leader for its construction and responsible of its operation. Initiative to set up and operate a CHORUS emulsion scanning laboratory at INFN Napoli.
  • Measurement of neutrino properties and of neutrino induced processes with the CHARM II and CHORUS experiments. Most sensitive limit to muon-neutrino to tau-neutrino oscillations with a short baseline experiment.
  • Initiative and proposal of new high-sensitivity, short-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments: TENOR and TOSCA.
  • Co-proponent of the conceptual idea of the OPERA experiment. Leader of the initial phase of the experiment, until its scientific approval. Spokesperson of the Collaboration from 2008 to 2012.
  • Co-author of the Technical Design Report of the CNGS neutrino beam.
  • Setting up of a cryogenic laboratory at INFN Napoli to develop LAr TPCs within the ICARUS project.
  • First indication of a non-zero theta13 angle in the PMNS neutrino mixing matrix with the T2K experiment.
  • World record drift track length in LAr TPCs with the ARGONTUBE detector
  • First application of UV laser calibration for LAr TPCs
  • Co-proponent of the use of nuclear emulsions for the AEgIS position detector.
  • Contribution to the setting up of the cyclotron laboratory of the Bern Inselspital for isotope production and research.
  • Discovery of electron-neutrino appearance with the T2K experiment.
  • Discovery of the Higgs boson with the ATLAS experiment.
  • Contribution to the realization of LAr TPC based experiments at Fermilab (MicroBooNe and SBND).
  • Discovery of muon-neutrino to tau-neutrino oscillations oscillation appearance with the OPERA experiment.
  • Initiative for an R&D project at CERN on LAr TPCs (ARGONCUBE)
  • Initiative for a long baseline project at Fermilab (LBNF/DUNE)
  • First measurement of muon-antineutrino disappearance with the T2K experiment.

Management and institutional duties

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  • Coordinator of the Napoli-INFN Electronics and Detector Workshop (1996-2004).
  • Member of the ICARUS Editorial Board (2002-2005).
  • Director of the High Energy Physics Laboratory (LHEP) at the Institute of Physics of the University of Bern (2006→).
  • Co-director of the Physics Institute of the University of Bern (2006→).
  • Member of six Committees for Full, Associate and TT Assistant Professorships (Universities of Bern, Geneva and Politecnico Milano) (2006→).
  • Member of the T2K Institute Board (2006→).
  • Member of the ATLAS Collaboration Board (2006→).
  • Chairperson of the OPERA Publication and Conference Board (2006-2008).
  • Chairperson of the OPERA Collaboration Board (2007-2008).
  • Member of the Executive Board of the Swiss Institute for Particle Physics (CHIPP) (2008-2010).
  • Spokesperson of the OPERA Collaboration (2008→2012).
  • Member of the T2K Speaker Committee (2008).
  • Director of the Albert Einstein Center for Fundamental Physics, Bern (2011→).
  • Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Sciences, University of Bern (2013→2015).
  • Chairperson of the SBND International Board (2014→)

Coordination of scientific projects

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  • Napoli PI of the CERN SPACAL/LAA experiment (1988-1990)
  • Napoli PI of the CERN RD1 experiment (1990-1992)
  • Italian national PI of the INFN-ITEP FORWARD experiment (1992-1994)
  • Napoli PI of the CERN RD46/ACTAR experiment (1995-1997)
  • Project Leader for the construction of the CERN CHORUS calorimeter (1990-1993)
  • Napoli PI of the CERN CHORUS experiment (1997-2001)
  • Italian national PI of the CERN TOSCA project (1996-1998)
  • Contact person of the CERN/LNGS OPERA project (1996-2002)
  • Napoli PI of the European Union TMR-ERB-PL-97-0319 project (1997-2002)
  • Napoli PI of the CERN/LNGS ICARUS experiment (2002-2006)
  • Bern PI of the CERN ATLAS experiment (2006→)
  • Bern PI of the CERN/LNGS OPERA experiment (2006-2008)
  • Bern PI of the J-PARC T2K experiment (2006→2014)
  • Bern PI of the EU 7FP project LAGUNA (2008→2011)
  • Bern PI of the CERN NA61 experiment (2006→)
  • Bern PI of the EU 7FP project LAGUNA-LBNO (2011→2013)
  • Bern PI of the SBND project (2013→)
  • Bern PI of the DUNE project (2014→)
  • Spokesperson of the ARGONCUBE Collaboration (2014→)

Membership and scientific committee

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Antonio Ereditato is member of several worldwide known institutes and societies, such as the IoP (Institute of Physics, UK), the Swiss Physical Society (SPS), the Italian Physical Society (SIF) the Pro ISSI (International Space Science Institute) association, Bern; the Aspen Institute Italy. Moreover, he served in many scientific committees:

  • CERN-INFN Technical Committee for the design of the CNGS neutrino beam (1997-2003)
  • CERN Large Hadron Collider Scientific Committee (LHCC) (1997-2001)
  • Member of the referee team of the LHCb experiment. Head referee for the ALICE experiment
  • CERN Proto-Synchrotron and Super-Proton-Synchrotron Scientific Committee (SPSC) (2006-2010)
  • Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) Council, Division II (2010→)
  • Swiss National Science Foundation Professorship Committee (2011→)
  • Program Advisory Committee (PAC) for High-Energy Physics of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) Dubna (2011→)
  • Swiss National Science Foundation FAID Committee for Interdisciplinary Proposals (2012→)
  • Fermilab interim International Executive Board (iIEB) for the Long Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) (2014→).

Antonio Ereditato has been invited speaker at over 40 international conferences and he is author of 749 papers in the InSPIRE database. Total number of citations (citeable papers): >49000, average citations per paper: 70. H-index: InSPIRE 101, Google Scholar 95

Among the publications, here below some relevant review papers and books:

  • A. Ereditato, Neutrino-Electron Scattering and sin²qw, Proc. of the 10th Int. Conf. on Physics in Collisions, Durham, 21-23 June 1990, Editions Frontieres, Gif-sur Yvette/World Scientific, Singapore (1990) 495.
  • A. Ereditato, V. Palladino and P. Strolin, L’Enigma del Neutrino, Sapere, Vol. 1 (982), Ed. Dedalo (1996) 37. (In Italian)
  • A. Ereditato and P. Migliozzi, Accelerator Studies of Neutrino Oscillations, La Rivista del Nuovo Cimento, Vol. 23, n. 12 (2000).
  • A. Ereditato, The Experimental Programme with the CNGS Neutrino Beam, Nucl. Phys. B. Proc. Suppl., 100 (2001) 200.
  • A. Ereditato, The Future of Calorimetry in High Energy Physics, Proc. of the 1st Int. Workshop on Charm, Beauty and CP, Frascati, 6-11 October 2002, Published in Frascati 2002, Charm, Beauty and CP, 335.
  • A. Ereditato, Present and Future of Neutrino Oscillation Experiments, Eur. Phys. J. direct C4 (S1), (2002) 38.
  • A. Ereditato, Present Status and Perspectives of Neutrino Oscillation Experiments, Proc. of the Int. Workshop on Heavy Quarks and Flavors, S. Juan de Puertorico, June 2004, Published in S. Juan 2004, Heavy Quarks and Leptons, 73.
  • P. Checchia and A. Ereditato, Particle Detectors for Future Collider Experiments, IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Magazine, Vol. 8, No. 2, June 2005, 27.
  • A. Ereditato, Calorimeter Issues Today, Proc. of the 12th Int. Conf. on Calorimetry in High Energy Physics, Chicago, 5-9 June 2006, AIP Conf. Proc., New York, 2006, Vol. 867, XV-XXIV.
  • A. Ereditato, Future Neutrino Oscillation Experiments, Proc. of the Vulcano Workshop 2006, Frontier Objects in Astrophysics and Particle Physics, Vulcano, 22-27 May 2006, SIF Conf. Proc., Bologna, Vol. 93 (2007) 555.
  • A. Ereditato, The Appearance of the Tau-Neutrino, Il Nuovo Saggiatore, Vol. 26, 3-4 (2010) 5.
  • A. Ereditato, The study of neutrino oscillations with emulsion detectors, Advances in High Energy Physics,

Vol. 2013, Article ID 382172, 2013doi:10.1155/2013/382172.

  • G. De Lellis, A. Ereditato, K. Niwa, Nuclear Emulsions, The Handbook of Particle Physics, Springer, 2011.
  • E. Amaldi, The adventurous life of Friedrich Georg Houtermans, physicist (1903-1966), Edited by S. Braccini, A. Ereditato, P. Scampoli, Springer Briefs in Physics, 2013.