Meenakshi Narain

Meenakshi Narain (May 9, 1964 – January 1, 2023) was an Indian-born American experimental physicist. She was a Professor of Physics and Chair of the Department of Physics at Brown University, and was also Chair of the Collaboration Board of U.S. institutions in the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) Collaboration. She contributed to the discovery of the top quark in 1995 and Higgs Boson in 2012.[2]

Meenakshi Narain
Born(1964-05-09)May 9, 1964
Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, India
DiedJanuary 1, 2023(2023-01-01) (aged 58)[1]
Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.
Alma mater
SpouseUlrich Heintz
Scientific career
FieldsExperimental physics
InstitutionsBoston University
Brown University
ThesisInclusive photon spectra from Υ decays (1991)
Doctoral advisorJuliet Lee-Franzini

Early life and education

Born on May 9, 1964,[1] in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, India, Narain identified as an Asian-Indian American. In high school, she had to transfer to another all-girls school to study on the math track that led her to physics and statistics as an undergraduate. She had to overcome the family expectation to choose physics over law.[3] She completed a B.Sc. at Gorakhpur University and a M.Sc. at IIT Kanpur. Narain earned her Ph.D. at Stony Brook University with her dissertation titled, Inclusive Photon Spectra from Upsilon States,[4] under the supervision of Juliet Lee-Franzini.[5]

Career
Brown Physics Professor and organizer of the Big Bang Science Fair, Meenakshi Narain, lights the WaterFire.

Following her doctorate, Narain was a visiting fellow at the Laboratory of Nuclear Studies, Cornell University, and then as a post-doc at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory from 1991–1995, where she was also a Wilson Fellow.[6]

Narain was on the faculty of Boston University for eight years prior to joining the Brown University faculty in 2007,[7][8] where she was promoted to full professor in 2010.[9] Her research activities have included the DØ experiment at Fermilab. She was instrumental in the discovery of the top quark in 1995.[10][11]

Narain participated in the CMS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, and contributed to the discovery Higgs Boson in 2012.[12] She served as Chair of the Collaboration Board of U.S. institutions in the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) Collaboration from July 2018 to July 2022.[13][14]

Narain was a frequent advocate for women in STEM fields,[15][16] and she also promoted science to the general public, in events such as the WaterFire Big Bang Science Fair in Providence, Rhode Island.[8]

Selected publications
  • Abachi, S.; et al. (April 3, 1995). "Observation of the Top Quark". Physical Review Letters. 74 (14): 2632–2637. arXiv:hep-ex/9503003. Bibcode:1995PhRvL..74.2632A. doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.74.2632. hdl:1969.1/181526. ISSN 0031-9007. PMID 10057979. S2CID 42826202.
  • CMS collaboration (2012). "Observation of a new boson at a mass of 125 GeV with the CMS experiment at the LHC". Physics Letters B. 716 (1): 30–61. arXiv:1207.7235. Bibcode:2012PhLB..716...30C. doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2012.08.021.

Awards, honors

References
  1. "Meenakshi Narain, 1964–2023 | Physics | Brown University". www.brown.edu. Retrieved January 3, 2023.
  2. "Meenakshi Narain 1964–2023". CERN Courier. March 1, 2023. Retrieved March 16, 2023.
  3. Huey-Wen Lin; Bryan Stanley. "My Journey as a Physicist: Prof. Meenakshi Narain (She/Her): Season 2 Episode 7". My Journey as a Physicist Podcast. Retrieved April 8, 2023.
  4. Narain, Meenakshi (1991). Inclusive Photon Spectra from Upsilon States. State University of New York, Stony Brook.
  5. "Physics Tree - Meenakshi Narain". academictree.org. Retrieved September 13, 2021.
  6. "Fermilab | For Physicists & Engineers | Fellowships". www.fnal.gov. Retrieved July 21, 2022.
  7. "Meenakshi Narain: A Physicist Working With Particle Accelerators and Helping Discover the Higgs Boson". INDIA New England News. May 25, 2018. Archived from the original on September 13, 2021. Retrieved September 13, 2021. Presently, Ms. Narain is co-leading the effort to establish the vision for opportunities at the collider in year 2023 and beyond. Narain is engaged in research and development towards the construction of the innermost part of detector using silicon sensors. Her research also deals with the analysis of large data sets and provides an excellent training ground for students in data science.
  8. Kwon, Diana. "Big Bang Science Fair at WaterFire Providence". symmetry magazine. Retrieved September 13, 2021. My vision is to make people appreciate science in the same way they appreciate art and music," Narain says. "If we can make people feel that science is a fun thing to do, learn and converse about, I think that could be a way to change our society.
  9. "2010 - Physics at Brown". studylib.net. p. 7. Retrieved July 22, 2022.
  10. Staley, Kent W.; Staley, Staley, Kent Wade (April 5, 2004). The Evidence for the Top Quark: Objectivity and Bias in Collaborative Experimentation. Cambridge University Press. p. 188. ISBN 978-0-521-82710-2.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  11. Sundermier, Ali. "How to make a discovery". symmetry magazine. Retrieved September 13, 2021. Narain's groups analysis was essential to the collaboration's understanding of a signal that turned out to be the elusive top quark.
  12. Heilprin, John (July 3, 2012). "Physicists ready data on 'God particle' to explain everything". The Boston Globe. pp. A4. Retrieved July 18, 2022. Meenakshi Narain, a physics professor at Brown University who works on one of the teams, said that although she could not disclose what will be announced on Wednesday, this was a "once in a lifetime event," because the experiments have provided enough data to give "at least the first hints of it in a significant way," or to rule out the existence of Higgs.
  13. "Professor Narain Elected US CMS Collaboration Board Chair | Physics | Brown University". www.brown.edu. Retrieved September 13, 2021.
  14. "Narain, Meenakshi". vivo.brown.edu. Retrieved September 13, 2021.
  15. Chen, Frances (April 22, 2015). "Female academics combat bias in STEM fields". Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved September 13, 2021.
  16. "Faculty, students reflect on STEM faculty gender gap". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved July 22, 2022.
  17. "DOE Outstanding Junior Investigator Program Awardees" (PDF). U.S.Department of Energy. 2009.
  18. "NSF Award Search: Award # 9984833 - CAREER: A Precision Measurement of the Top Quark Mass". www.nsf.gov. Retrieved July 23, 2022.
  19. "Fellows". Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Retrieved July 22, 2022.
  20. "APS Fellow Archive". www.aps.org. Retrieved July 21, 2022.
  21. "2008 Career Development Award Recipients | ADVANCE at Brown". www.brown.edu. Retrieved July 22, 2022.
  22. "LHC Physics Center | LPC Fellows | Meenakshi Narain". lpc.fnal.gov. Retrieved July 23, 2022.
  23. "DORA | IIT Kanpur Distinguished Alumnus Awardee 2020". www.iitk.ac.in. Retrieved July 22, 2022.
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