DRD5 / RDquantum - Quantum Sensor R&D for Particle Physics

What's this about? -- status 16-September-2026

DRD5 (Detector R&D Collaboration 5) is part of a large effort to develop detectors for future particle physics experiments in a number of technologies (thus DRD1 .. DRD8). DRD5 / RDq focuses on R&D on Quantum Sensors for Particle Physics, both at high and low energies. Several introductory documents describing the goals can be found here.

The DRD5 proposal was approved on 6/6/2024 by CERN's Research Board, after having been recommended by CERN's DRDC (Detector R & D Committee) based on the submitted proposal and a presentation to the DRDC on June 4th, 2024.

The collaboration is growing (now 121 institutes worldwide). The Collaboration Board (CB) chair is Marcel Demarteau (ORNL); the CB consists of one representative for each of the participating institutes. The spokesperson is Michael Doser (CERN); the deputy spokesperson is Steven Worm (DESY). The top-level WP leaders of the six WP's can be found here. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the participating institutes and CERN has now been finalised; the final version has been sent to all institutes via their CB representative, and the signature process is about to commence. In parallel, work is starting on an updated version of the DRD5 proposal as requested by the DRDC — led by the WP leaders for their respective WP's — with the process expected to converge by the end of the year. The individual WP's have started their respective activities as detailed in the proposal's milestones (also see: what's happening).

If you are interested in being involved, please contact Marcel Demarteau or Michael Doser. We will require a short description of your DRD5-related activities and interests. All applications need to be agreed to by the CB. Joining and membership is free of cost for academic institutions.

Sign up to receive regular (five-six / year) updates via the DRD5-updates e-group at CERN. if you have a CERN-registered email account. To obtain one, click here. Otherwise, you can send an email to the spokesperson michael.doser@cern.ch or to georgy.kornakov@cern.ch to be added to the list with your email.