Nikhef’s ambitions for four major scientific facilities have been recognized in the National Roadmap for Large-Scale Scientific Infrastructure. Minister Van Engelshoven of Education and Science officially received the report this week.
The national roadmaps are awards for investments larger than 10 million euros in the infrastructure needed for groundbreaking scientific research in the Netherlands. This can involve data networks, computing capacity, large instruments. The roadmap covers wishes and needs from all scientific disciplines, from social sciences to exact sciences.
In the Roadmap 2021, nine groups representing the Dutch research field present their priorities for investment in large-scale scientific infrastructure for the next ten years. These research infrastructures are called essential for answering new scientific questions.
Nikhef is involved in four of the six new facilities considered desirable in the Astronomy and Particle Physics group. These are the GRAND proposal for a new very large detector with thousands of antennas for cosmic rays, possibly in China.
In addition, investments are needed in the further expansion of the LHC accelerator at CERN to much more intense beams, HL-LHC. Nikhef also wants to participate in large projects for cosmic neutrinos and dark matter, DUNE and DARWIN.
Nikhef is also involved in plans for new installations for the detection of gravity waves, both the LISA project in space and the Einstein Telescope, which may be built in South Limburg. SRON for space research is also committed to this.
The fact that the plans are now on the list does not mean that they will actually be invested in, but it does mean that the research needs have been recognized. As much as 200 million euros will be available over the next five years to further develop the projects.
In previous rounds of the National Roadmap, Nikhef received three large grants, one for the construction and installation of the KM3NeT neutrino telescope in the Mediterranean (2018), one for upgrades to the LHC accelerator at CERN (2014), and for FUSE, a computational facility for astronomy and particle physics (2020).