Yasaman Farzan

School of Physics, Institute for research in Fundamental Sciences (IPM),                                 
P.O. Box, 19395-5531
Tehran, Iran.

Email: yasaman@theory.ipm.ac.ir

 

A brief scientific autobiography
In 1990, I entered Farzanegan (Tizhooshan) high school in Tabriz. In 1993, I participated and succeeded in the internal physics Olympiad. I was chosen among the five students of the Iranian team to compete in the international Olympiad, held in Beijing, China in 1994. I was the first female student from Iran who had succeeded to be on the team.

In 1994, I was enrolled in  the Physics department  of Sharif Univ. In 1998, I completed my undergraduate studies.  In the same year, I  started  my MSc studies in Sharif University and defended after one year. My MS thesis was entitled  "Axions in large extra dimensions".  In 1999,  I was enrolled as a PhD student at SISSA (International School for Advanced Studies) which is located in Trieste, Italy.  I chose neutrino physics as my research area. I was lucky enough to be accepted as a student by Prof. A. Yu. Smirnov who is a leading neutrino physicist. After two years, in 2001,  my husband was offered a Post-doc position at Stanford and I accompanied him to  the USA. Before going to the USA, we had correspondence with the head of the theory group of Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), Prof.  Michael Peskin. He encouraged me to complete my thesis as  a long term visitor at their institute. While in the USA, I kept in touch with my supervisor and wrote more papers together and at the same time I benefited from the outstanding scientific atmosphere at SLAC. In 2004, we returned to Italy and I defended my thesis. After my PhD, I returned to Iran to build up a particle physics phenomenology group at IPM, Tehran where I am currently a full professor. To see a brief overview of the activities of our group at IPM, you may visit this homepage. My updated CV is available here. I am also an invited member of the physics branch of Iranian academy of science.

Awards and honors

1) 2013 ICTP prize:

 Videos of the prize ceremony and my presentation at 50th anniversary of ICTP;

2) 2008 IUPAP Young Scientist Prize;

3) ICTP junior associate member, 1 Jan 2007-31 Dec 2012;

4) The Khwarizmi young scientist Award, 2006;

5) Ranking first in the nationwide 98 entrance exam of  MSc in physics;

6) Ranking first in my undergraduate class;

7) Winning i) honorable mention; ii) best girl student; iii) silver medal in theory
in the International physics Olympiad held in China in 1994;

8)  An outstanding referee of APS journals.

 

 

My presentation at ICHEP08

List of publication
A list of my publications is available here.

Networks

Invisibles  (April 2012-March 2016), Invisibles+ (2016-2020) and Elusives (2016-2020)  are  European ITN projects supported by H2020  which focus on Neutrino and Dark Matter phenomenology and their connection. Experimental and theoretical aspects are also encompassed. The networks involve nodes in seven European countries and their associated partners extend to seven non-European countries

I am the coordinator of the Iran node of  these networks. As an activity of this network in Iran, we organized IPP13 meeting at IPM, Tehran. For more information about these networks you may visit their websites at the following links:

Invisibles,  Invisibles+ and Elusives.
 

Experiences as an organizer and editor
Since I have entered the physics school of  IPM, several steps have been taken to form a high energy phenomenology group at this institute, among which one may list the following activities:


1) In 2005:                  Summer School on the Phenomenological Aspects of  the Elementary Particle Physics;
 In this school, I covered neutrino physics.

2) In May 2006:           IPM school and conference on Lepton and Hadron Physics, IPM-LHP06; 

The proceedings are available at here.

3) In October 2007: A national school on phenomenological and experimental aspects of particle physics.  I gave five lectures on the MSSM in this school. website.

4) In May 2008:            IPM International School and Workshop on Electroweak Physics;

5)  In September 2011: IPM school and workshop on recent developments in Particle Physics (IPP11);

6) In September 2012: IPM international school and workshop on Particle Physics (IPP12): Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics;

7) In May 2013:             IPM international school and workshop on Particle Physics (IPP13): Flavor physics and dark matter;

8) In December 2013: IPM one-day school on symmetries in high energy physics;

9) In January 2014: Meeting on challenges of physics education;

10) In September 2014: IPM school and workshop on Particle Physics (IPP14): Leptogenesis and dark matter;

11)  In September 2015: IPM school and conference on Particle Physics (IPP15): Neutrino physics, dark matter and B-physics;

12)  From 2005 to 2010, I was  in charge of arranging the weekly meetings of our phenomenology journal club.

13) I am in charge of arranging our monthly colloquia. More information about the seminars in our department can be found at this website.

Moreover I have been on the advisory board of the following international events held overseas.

Teaching experience

1) 2010, fall semester:      A course on particle physics;

2) 2010, fall semester:      A course on field theory;

3) 2011, Spring semester: A course on particle physics;

4) 2012, fall semester:      Beyond the Standard Model of particles;

5) 2013, Spring semester: Elementary particles in cosmology;

6) 2015, fall semester: Quantum field theory I;

7) 2016, Spring semester: Standard model of particle physics;

8)  2016, fall semester: Numerical methods in particle physics;

9) 2017, Spring semester: The role of particles in early universe.

 

Educational material
Following the phenomenology school that we held in the summer of 2005, I have prepared a pedagogical review of neutrino physics  in Farsi which is available here. In 2014, I prepared this educational text on dark matter.

I have also written two electronic pedagogical books for Payam Noor Univ in Farsi.

Science and Society

I have summarized my viewpoints on the challenges of popularizing  physics in Iran in this audio file. The following is a list of my articles for non-physicists published in different newspapers and journals:

I have also written an introduction for the biography of Emmy Noether translated by Hassan Fattahi.

During fall 2018 and winter 2019, I carried out a project studying attitude and preference of Iranian contemporary society on choosing physics, mathematics and engineering for higher education as career path. The project was based on an online survey and a series of interviews with friends of different backgrounds. In this pdf file, I have summarized my analysis of the survey and the interviews. I have then enumerated some practical suggestions to enhance the determination and morale of the college students who have already chosen this path.

 BLOG and short stories

I regularly write my take on scientific events in my blog.  I also have a more personal blog  under pen name Minjigh which means bead or artificial pearl.

I enjoy writing short stories. You may find the list of short stories by me here.

 

Humanitarian Cause

I am an enthusiastic supporter of child foundation (English site, Iranian site, German site).

Last update: March, 2019