Prof. Dr. Freya Blekman

Education

• 2005
  Ph.D University of Amsterdam (Nikhef)
  
  

• 2000
  M.Sc. University of Amsterdam (Nikhef)
  
  

Employment

• Since 2014
  Associate Professor (research focus) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, CMS experiment and FCC-ee. Primary focus: Searches for physics beyond the standard model in the top sector
  
  

• 2010 – 2014
  Assistant Professor (research focus) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, CMS experiment. Primary focus: Searches for physics beyond the standard model in the top sector
  
  

• 2007
  - 2010 Research Associate at Cornell University, CMS experiment. Primary focus: Pixel detector commissioning and measurement of the top quark pair production cross section in the frst LHC data
  
  

• 2005 – 2007
  Research Associate at Imperial College London, CMS experiment and Dzero experiment. Primary focus: CMS software, CMS trigger, particle flow, tau identifcation
  
  

• By convention, articles published by particle physics experiments list all collaboration members in strict alphabetical order. This policy reflects the substantial efforts in detector construction and maintenance, data acquisition, data reconstruction and calibration that all collaborators contribute to and which is a prerequisite to any data analysis. This is particularly relevant for those who have committed a substantial fraction of their time to construction, installation and commissioning of detectors. Also note that the papers from large collaborations such as the CMS experiment are almost exclusively published in high impact factor journals (in the first quartile, Q1) with impact factors around 5, whereas Nature Physics (IF: 20) and Science (IF: 30) should be considered as rather unconventional publication channels in the hep-ex field, with more PR than scientific impact value.

• As such, scientific leadership, which is awarded after selection on merits and excellence within the collaboration, as are conference presentations, add a reliable additional measure of scientific productivity in the hep-ex field than merely citations alone. Like many fundamental physics disciplines, the inspireHEP database is used for citation/publication metrics and preprint monitoring. If I focus only on the 76 papers to which I have made a provable contribution, my Hirsh index would be around 45.

Scientific leadership in CMS collaboration at CERN, Switzerland (highlights)

• First ever CMS Physics Communication Officer, responsible for the communication and outreach of 130+ scientific papers per year, since 2018

• Member (2016 – 2017) and consecutively co-chairperson of the CMS Publication Committee on Supersymmetry, final responsible for the publication of all journal papers on Supersymmetry searches by the CMS collaboration, 2016 – 2019

• As the founder of the Beyond-Two-Generations physics group in the CMS experiment at CERN with 250 members world-wide, I have enabled the rapidly growing new research area of the CMS experiment with output (as of present) 60+ journal publications (12 produced during my tenure as convener) on the topic of searches for new physics using top quarks in the exotica sector, 2012 – 2014

• Convener CMS pixel offline software group, leading an international team of 50 people working on silicon pixel reconstruction software, i.e. simulation, digitization and reconstruction of pixel detector data, data quality monitoring, databases and calibration, including cosmic ray studies, 2008 – 2009

• Director of Undergraduate studies VUB Ba & Ma Physics & Astronomy, since 2018

• Vice-chairperson of the VUB department of Physics & Astronomy, since 2018

• Member of executive committee VUB faculty of Science and Bioengineering, 2015 – 2018

• President of the PR and Outreach Council, VUB Faculty of Science and Bioengineering, 2014 – 2018

• Secretary of Examination/Admissions Council, VUB Master of Physics and Astrophysics, 2014 – 2018

• Secretary of Examination Council, VUB Bachelor of Physics and Astrophysics, 2014 – 2018

• Twitter: @freyablekman

• Featured at CERN during a extremely successful YouTube video series on the restart of the large hadron collider in 2015: Watch the video here .

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