Mission/Mandate
Additional Information

High energy collider experiments have shown that there are many fundamental particles, and some of them are more than 100 times heavier a proton. Among those fundamental particles, the most mysterious is the Higgs boson that was found in 2012 at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. It is responsible for generating the masses of most of the fundamental particles. Other mysteries include differences between matter and anti-matter – why are they different at all? and the nature of dark matter – which we know is more common than ordinary matter but still have not been caught in our detectors.

Particle physics is now both moving to the higher intensity and higher energy machines to study the nature of the Higgs boson in depth and search for new massive or rarely produced particles, and underground to study neutrino interactions and to possibly detect dark matter in ultra-clean environments. Particle theory is important to guide experiments, and it also plays a key role in connecting particle physics with cosmology, gravity, and the ultimate physical laws at the beginning of the Universe.

High Energy physics has a long history of international collaboration and we must collaborate to afford the massive but precise detectors needed to study elementary particles. Modern high energy physics experiments bring together hundreds of scientists from dozens of nations to work together on common projects. Our mission in C11 is to assure that scientists are able to freely travel and share their work. As part of this mission IUPAP C11 supports and monitors major international conferences and encourages inclusion of younger scientists, women and scientists from developing countries. As the international body for the field, C11 also convenes working groups and panels such as the International Committee on Future Accelerators to provide a forum for international coordination.