Author: Anna Di Ciaccio
The four major international collaborations at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider — ATLAS, CMS, ALICE and LHCb — have been jointly awarded the 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, in recognition of their outstanding contributions to advancing our understanding of the fundamental laws of nature.
The prize honours the achievements of thousands of scientists, engineers and technicians from more than 70 countries, whose collective work during the LHC’s second data-taking run has delivered groundbreaking results in particle physics. Their research has deepened knowledge of the Higgs boson, explored the quark–gluon plasma, and revealed new insights into matter–antimatter asymmetries and the structure of hadrons.
The ATLAS and CMS collaborations were recognized for precision studies of the Higgs boson and its role in the mechanism that gives mass to fundamental particles. ALICE was honoured for its investigations of the primordial state of matter that existed shortly after the Big Bang, while LHCb was celebrated for its discoveries in flavour physics and for testing fundamental symmetries.
The $3 million prize will be donated in full to the CERN & Society Foundation, which will allocate the funds to support doctoral fellowships and training opportunities for young researchers at CERN, helping to inspire and equip the next generation of scientists.
The Breakthrough Prize, established in 2012, is among the most prestigious distinctions in science, celebrating major achievements in fundamental research. This year’s award acknowledges both the scientific excellence and the global spirit of cooperation that define CERN’s mission.
The Breakthrough Prize winners are selected by selection committees made up of previous laureates. The cash for the prize is provided by personal foundations founded by Sergey Brin & Anne Wojcicki, Mark Zuckerberg & Priscilla Chan, and Yuri & Julia Milner, among others.
This recognition also resonates within the European Physical Society (EPS) community. Three members of the EPS Executive Committee — Anna Di Ciaccio (ATLAS), Alessandra Fantoni (ALICE) and Ulrich Husemann (CMS) — are active participants in the LHC collaborations. Their involvement underlines the strong connection between CERN’s pioneering research and the broader European physics community represented by the EPS, united by a shared commitment to collaboration, excellence, and the advancement of science.
LHC is in the middle of Run 3 and prepares for the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) phase, the collaborations continue to push the boundaries of precision and discovery, paving the way for new insights into the nature of the universe.
More about the 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics: https://breakthroughprize.org/Laureates/1
