Ákos Csilling

CV [ps.gz] [pdf] (November 2002)
and publication list [ps.gz] [pdf] (November 2002)

Private

See separate page for unofficial projects. (Mainly programming.)

Work

Research Fellow at CERN.
On leave form KFKI Research Institute for Particle and Nuclear Physics

I work in experimental high energy physics. Most of my research uses data from the OPAL and L3 detectors at the LEP accelerator recently dismantled at CERN, and I also participate in the preparations for the CMS detector at the LHC accelerator being built in place of LEP.

Building DAQ column prototype of CMS

The DAQ column represents a vertical slice of the CMS DAQ system. The goal of the project is to demonstrate the feasibility of operating together all the custom and commercial HW and SW components of the final system with adequate performance. An important part is the debugging of the components developed within the group.
  • First prototype based on VME processors running XDAQ under VxWorks, using a FED emulator, TTCrx monitor, TTCvi and some NIM logic. Efficient use of the available limited hardware bandwidth demonstrated.
  • Second prototype based on Linux machines, Myrinet network, new XDAQ version, the Fedkit package, improved TTCrx monitor, TTCvi and NIM logic. Performance goal achieved.
  • The next step is to add the FRL to the current setup.

    Halwish

    Extension to use the custom Hardware Access Library from within tcl/Tk scripts. Available here.

    The HAL library provides an easy to use interface for PCI and VME hardware access from C++ programs. I embedded it in tcl/Tk to provide halwish, a tcl/Tk shell with the added functionality of HAL. This started as a quick hack for a colleague, but fully functional for VME cards, except block transfers. For each card you give an address table and define a command name. This command can be used to read and write the registers defined in the address map.

    Allows to access cards interactively without any programming. Also very practical for writing GUIs to cards, I have one for the TTCvi card, which updates the status every second and has buttons for commands.

    Open beauty production in two-photon events with OPAL

    The goal is to measure the total cross-section of open beauty production in two-photon collisions. This is the continuation of work started by Johannes Elmsheuser, he continues with the muon channel.
  • Work on the electron channel has just started.

    Charm structure function of the photon with OPAL

    The charm structure function of the photon is measured by identifying charm (with the D*-tag method) in single-tag two-photon (e-gamma DIS) events.
  • Presentation at the Low-x workshop in Antwerpen 16-19 September 2002
  • Measurement of the Charm Structure Function F_2,c of the Photon at LEP, CERN-EP-2002-031, Phys. Lett. B539 (2002) 13-24.
  • Photon 2001 presentation Measurement of the charm structure of the photon at LEP hep-ex/0112006

    Open charm production in two-photon events with OPAL

    The total cross-section of open charm production in untagged two-photon events is measured using the D*-tag method to identify charm. The x_T=p_T/W_vis distribution is used to estimate the ratio of direct vs. resolved events, needed because of the different detection efficiencies for the two processes.
  • OPAL PN 490, Measurement of the Charm Structure Function F_2,c of the Photon at LEP
  • EPS HEP 2001 presentation Hadronic structure of the photon at LEP hep-ex/0112020
  • Photon 2000 presentation: Charm and bottom production in two-photon collisions with OPAL, hep-ex/0010060
  • OPAL PN 453, Inclusive Production of D* Mesons in Photon-Photon Collisions
  • Seminar at UCL: Photon Structure and More
  • DPF 2000 presentation: QCD measurements in two-photon collisions at LEP, OPAL CR 451, hep-ex/0011056

    Measurement of sigma(gamma gamma -> chi_c_2) in OPAL

    Supervised summer student project in 2001. This became his diploma thesis and he successfully graduated.

    Study of diffraction in two-photon collisions with OPAL

    Supervised summer student projects in 2001 and 2002.

    The last student demonstrated that a signal is present in the data, and it can indeed be observed with suitable background subtraction.

    Study of diffractive vector meson production with L3

    Diffraction has been measured at HERA and at hadron colliders, but not at LEP and in two-photon collisions. However, it is an important source of uncertainty in the measurement of the total cross-section. It is difficult to measure, since the scattering angles are small, and the forward detectors are not well suited to recognise them. Also the MC models have very different predictions.
  • Ph.D. Thesis (LaTeX source) on Vector-Meson pair production in two photon collisions detected by the L3 Collaboration
  • Presentation at the Triangle symposium, Zagreb, 1999, writeup as KFKI preprint KFKI-1999-08, hep-ex/9910051
  • Presentation and writeup at the Photon'99 Conference on Vector-Meson pair production in two photon collisions.
  • Seminar at the Eotvos University: Photon-photon interactions
  • Presentation at the Scientific Board of the KFKI RMKI Institute (In hungarian)
  • L3 internal note 2355.
  • Presentation at the Photon'97 Conference and its writeup
  • Correction of '94 two-photon EPIO data (epv.ps.gz, 137k)

    Study of B oscillations with CMS

    The main goal was to study the reach of CMS in the B^0_s oscillation parameter x_s.
  • Diploma work Study of B0s oscillations with CMS
  • Presentation at ICPS'95 (icps.ps.gz, 55k)

    Contribution to the pattern comparator trigger for CMS

    Summer student project in 1993.

    I extracted the hit patterns from GEANT simulations of single muons in the CMS detector.

    Statistical physics

    This was an optional student project, my first experience with C and unix.

    The model consists of a lattice where the individual cells are driven by a chaotic evolution while the migration between neighbouring cells is governed by a threshold.

    The behaviour of the system goes from chaotic to self-organized critical as function of the threshold level.

  • Scientific Student Club (TDK) thesis: Presence of self organised critical behaviour in a new population dinamical model
  • Presentation at ICPS'93: SOC defeats chaos

    Optics at the Universidad Complutense in Madrid

    A summer practice in Spain, after the second year at University.

    I used the Mathematica program to calculate the resolution and contrast in an interferometer as function of the coating thickness on the surface of the semi-transparent mirrors. I introduced a parameter to describe their relative importance. Then I rewrote the spanish draft in English.

  • J. J. Monzon, L. L. Sanchez-Soto, and A. Csilling, Method for Coating Optimization in a Fabry-Perot Interferometer, Applied Optics, 32 (1993) 4282.

    Space physics in Max Planck Institut fur Aeronomie, Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany

    A summer practice after first year university.

    Thermal study for the MAREMF low energy electron spectrometer for the Mars'98 mission. This seemed a long way into the future... The mission failed, so I have no idea whether the simulation was reasonable or not.

    Ákos Csilling