SA-CERN celebrates 15 years of advancing physics in South Africa

SA-CERN celebrates 15 years of advancing physics in South Africa

December 2024 marked 15 years since the launch of the South Africa-European Organisation for Nuclear Research (SA-CERN), a programme that has contributed immensely to the growth of the physics community in South Africa. To mark this remarkable international partnership, the National Research Foundation (NRF) will host an anniversary celebration event at the iThemba Laboratory for Accelerator Based Sciences (NRF-iThemba LABS)’s Cape Town campus on 20 and 21 January 2025.

The two-day event will feature a series of high-level talks and reflections on the SA-CERN consortium including a keynote address by the Deputy Minister for Science, Technology & Innovation, Ms Nomalungelo Gina, as well as presentations from key stakeholders and leading physicists.  Members of the media are invited to the event. 

Event details:

Venue: NRF-iThemba LABS, Old Faure Road, Faure, Cape Town

Date: 20 and 21 January 2025

Start Time: 09:00

Funded by the Department of Science and Innovation and the NRF, the SA-CERN is a national programme that was launched in December 2008 to advance the country’s physics capabilities. Over the years, the programme has brought many opportunities that allowed South African physicists to contribute to major global scientific advances, which includes the discovery of the Higgs-Boson particle in July 2012. Physicists from South Africa and other African countries were part of a global collaboration of more than 3 000 physicists from 183 institutions in 38 countries behind the Higgs-Boson discovery. 

A partnership with CERN, the world’s largest particle physics laboratory located on the border of Switzerland and France, SA-CERN provides an opportunity to South African physics researchers to conduct research at these premier research facilities. In return, South Africa gets to grow its physics research to become globally competitive and innovative, participates in global science, and attracts brightest young South Africans into science and technology, among a range of things.

SA-CERN is one of initiatives through which the NRF facilitates collaboration and access to global, cutting-edge research infrastructure for the benefit of the local physics discipline. The others are Russia’s Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility based in France and the International Centre for Theoretical Physics based in Italy.

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