In the following years the experimental division of IFAE grew from a staff of 10 to about 80. The experimental program has expanded both in the number of projects and in their scope. In 1991 the division was involved in just one experiment in high-energy particle physics, ALEPH at LEP, while at present there are nine projects belonging to three main lines of fundamental research: particle physics at high energy accelerators, gamma-ray astronomy, and observational cosmology. In addition, there is a small but very active line of applied physics, devoted to novel techniques in medical imaging.
The theory division also expanded its research program since IFAE was created. There are at present three main lines of research: Standard Model physics, Beyond the Standard Model, and Astroparticles/Cosmology.
An additional important development took place in 2003, driven by the strongly perceived need for remote handling of vast quantities of scientific data, not only for high-energy physics experiments but also for astrophysical facilities such as MAGIC. In 2003, three Spanish institutions, UAB, CIEMAT in Madrid and the Departament d’Universitats Recerca i Societat de la Informació (DURSI) of the Government of Catalonia, together with IFAE, jointly founded the Port of Scientific Information (PIC). This center is a focal point of the global computing grid for scientific projects requiring the processing of large amounts of data. PIC was chosen by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education as a Tier-1 center for LHC computing. IFAE was charged by the other partner institutions with the administration of PIC. There is a very close collaboration with PIC on computational aspects of all IFAE experiments that are producing data or will do so in the near future. The scientific activities of PIC are summarized in chapter 2.10 in this report.
It is worth emphasizing that, as an independent legal entity, IFAE can manage its own projects as well as certain external ones. These management activities have been a very visible contribution of IFAE to the development of Spanish scientific infrastructures, which might not have been possible otherwise. The most important among these activities are briefly recalled next.
From 1995 to 2001 the Synchrotron Light Laboratory of Barcelona (LLS) was administratively part of IFAE. The LLS was the organization that proposed and prepared the construction of ALBA, the Synchrotron Light Laboratory.
IFAE was responsible for the construction of the building that services the MAGIC telescopes at the Roque de los Muchachos site in the island of La Palma. IFAE also manages the maintenance and operation funds of the MAGIC collaboration.
From 1999 to 2004, IFAE managed the contract between CERN and a Spanish company for the construction of the vacuum vessels of the ATLAS Barrel Toroid. This very large project had a cost of about three million euro distributed over several years.
In 2007, the observational cosmology group of IFAE and others proposed the PAU (Physics of the Accelerating Universe) initiative, which was approved as a Consolider-Ingenio 2010 project. IFAE led the PAU collaboration, comprised of several Spanish groups. The goal of this initiative remains to survey a fraction of the Northern sky in order to measure parameters of cosmological interest by means of novel observational tools.
Since the past decade, the relationship between IFAE and the Generalitat of Catalonia is regulated under a Contract-Program, which codifies the support of the Institute from the Generalitat and the corresponding obligations of IFAE. Based on a strategic plan, the Contract-Program specifies the envisaged growth of the Institute’s personnel and funding. The scientific and academic goals are specified in a set of numerical indicators, which are reported on a yearly basis. The past Contract-Program covered the period from 2007 to 2012 included. Since 2012, because of the current economic uncertainties, it has been extended one year at a time.
In 2012 IFAE was granted the Severo Ochoa award, a distinction given by the Spanish ministry to the best research institutes in the country. The prize carries funding of 1 M€ a year for four years and is strengthening IFAE’s activities and its capabilities to obtain additional funding. Manel Martínez is the scientific director of IFAE’s Severo Ochoa award.
In 2015 IFAE joined five other top research centers in Catalonia (CRG, ICIQ, ICN2, ICFO and IRB, all Severo Ochoa prize winners), in areas ranging from nanotechnology and photonics to chemistry, genomics and biomedicine, to create the Barcelo- na Institute of Science and Technology (BIST), with the goals to cooperate in, among other areas, training and knowledge and technology transfer, to build critical mass for international visibility, and to encourage multidisciplinary research. During 2016, its first full year of operation, the BIST started preparing several joint initiatives, including a joint call for PhD grants; preparation of a BIST-wide MSc program in interdisciplinary research; joint application to two European Union COFUND actions; a program providing seed money for research projects carried out in at least two BIST institutes, etc.
In 2017 IFAE obtained the Severo Ochoa award renewal for 4 more years. The award recognizes excellent research centres that stand out for their scientific impact and the international relevance of their results. Also, IFAE celebrated its 25th Anniversary in an event held at MACBA, Barcelona on July 7th 2017. In 2018 IFAE became a new member institution inside the VIRGO collaboration. This opens a new long-term experimental research line in IFAE related to GWs detection using terrestrial interferometry.
Finally, in 2019 IFAE opened a new applied research line in Quantum Computing Technologies.