Karsten Heeger

Karsten Heeger is the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics and Director of Wright Laboratory at Yale University. His research focuses on the study of neutrino oscillations, neutrino mass, and dark matter. 

Heeger was involved in the resolution of the solar neutrino problem with the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO), the first observation of reactor antineutrino oscillation with KamLAND, and the first measurement of the neutrino mixing angle q₁₃ with Daya Bay. Heeger is PI and co-spokesperson of PROSPECT, a precision measurement of reactor antineutrinos and search for sterile neutrinos at very short baselines. He is studying the nature of neutrinos with the CUORE double beta decay experiment and performing R&D with Project 8 towards a novel experiment to measure neutrino mass. In 2021, he was elected co-spokesperson of CUPID, the CUORE Upgrade with Particle Identification.

Prof. Heeger received his undergraduate degree in physics from Oxford University and his Ph.D. from the University of Washington in Seattle where he worked on a model-independent measurement of the solar ⁸B neutrino flux in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO). Before joining the faculty at Yale University he was on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin and a Chamberlain Fellow at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. 

Heeger has served on national and international committees including as Deputy Chair of the 2023 Particle Physics Project Prioritization Panel (P5), the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel (HEPAP), the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee (NSAC), the Division of Particles and Fields (DPF) Executive Committee, and the American Physical Society (APS) Committee on International Scientific Affairs. He was a member of the 2015 Nuclear Physics Long Range Planning Group, the US ATLAS Project Advisory Group, and has served on review committees for the US Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation, and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada (NSERC). He is co-chair of the APS DPF Coordinating Panel of Advanced Detectors (CPAD). 

Prof. Heeger was Associate Editor for the European Physical Journal C and Journal of Physics G and is a reviewer for Physics Review, NIM, Physics Letters, and others.

Appointments

2019 - 2025 Chair, Physics Department, Yale University

2024 - Present Co-Director, Yale Center for the Invisible Universe, Yale University

2013 – Present Director, Wright Laboratory, Yale University

2013 –  Present Professor of Physics, Yale University

2012 – 2013 Professor of Physics, University of Wisconsin, Madison

2009 – 2012 Associate Professor of Physics, University of Wisconsin, Madison

2006 – 2009 Assistant Professor of Physics, University of Wisconsin, Madison

2002 – 2006 Chamberlain Fellow, Physicist Scientist, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Education 

Ph.D. in Physics, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA (2002)

Thesis: Model-Independent Measurement of the Neutral Current Interaction Rate of Solar 8B Neutrinos with Deuterium in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, Advisor: Prof. R.G.H. Robertson

Master of Arts (M.A.), Oxford University, Oxford, England (1999)

Master of Science (M.Sc.) in Physics, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, USA  (1996)

Bachelor of Arts (B.A. Hons.) in Physics, Oxford University, England  (1995)

Service and Leadership

2021 –  2025 CUPID, international co-spokesperson

2022 –  2023 Particle Physics Project Prioritization Panel (P5), Deputy chair

2020 –  2022 Coordinating Panel for Advanced Detectors (CPAD), co-chair

2016 –  2017 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), Subatomic Physics Evaluation Section, Co-chair

2015 –  2018 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), Subatomic Physics Evaluation Section, Member

2016 –  2017 ASCAC Independent LDRD Review of DOE Laboratories, Member

2014 – 2017 High Energy Physics Advisory Committee (HEPAP), Member

2014 –  2017 Nuclear Physics Advisory Committee (NSAC), Member

Honors & Awards

Heeger’s research work has been recognized with numerous awards. For his thesis work he was awarded the 2003 APS Dissertation Award in Nuclear Physics. In 2008 he received Outstanding Junior Investigator awards from DOE Nuclear Physics for the investigation of neutrino properties with bolometric detectors and from DOE High Energy Physics for the measurement of the neutrino mixing angle theta13 at Daya Bay. Heeger was awarded an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in 2009 and a University of Wisconsin Romnes Faculty Fellowship in 2011. He was named a Kavli Fellow in 2012 and elected Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2013. He shared the 2016 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics as a member of three collaborations: SNO, KamLAND, and Daya Bay.

Outreach

Karsten Heeger promotes the value of science in society by leading and participating in a variety of outreach efforts, including scientific demonstrations for students in the Yale Pathways to Science program, presenting invited talks, leading tours of Wright Lab, and developing Summer Explorations in Science, Technology, and the Natural World, which is a summer program for middle school students.

Heeger also has a strong passion to connect art and science through exhibits and programming to educate, inspire, entertain, enrich, and engage people of varied ages and backgrounds. More information about his efforts in the arts as Director of Wright Lab can be found on the Wright Lab Arts webpage.

Selected Publications: 

• INSPIRE publications
• Google Scholar
• ORCID iD
• ResearcherID