Dear LHC-TI Steering Committee Members,

    There was discussion of the LHC Theory Initiative at
the Aspen workshop on electroweak symmetry breaking which
concluded last week. The organizers of the workshop
(Csaba Csaki, Konstantin Matchev, and John Terning) and
I drafted the attached consensus statement of support, which
has been endorsed by 25 of the participants (listed at the bottom).

    A few of more points:

1. In addition to support of postdocs and students, which
all supported, there was also some (though not unanimous)
support for $50K sabbatical fellowships for junior faculty.Ê

2. There has been some discussion since of limiting the number of
fellowships at a particular institution (or perhaps as endorsed by
a particular individual) in each category to one of each type at any given.

3. Other names have been suggested -- including "Fermi" or "Bethe"
fellowships.

    Best,

    Sekhar

We the undersigned participants in the 2005 Aspen Summer Workshop on New Approaches to Electroweak Symmetry Breaking strongly endorse the LHC Theory Initiative. The goal of the LHC program is to explore the electroweak symmetry breaking sector and to search for physics beyond the standard model. In order to interpret the data from the LHC, it is essential that there be theoretical studies to establish the experimental signatures which could arise from new physics and to calculate precisely the properties of the standard model processes which provide the backgrounds to these signals. To fully realize the promise of the LHC, therefore, the large investment in the US experimental high-energy physics community in the LHC must be complemented by a significant investment in US LHC-related theoretical physics.

We believe that the focus of the Theory Initiative should be to support the research of those graduate students and postdocs most likely to establish a career in LHC-related theoretical physics over the twenty year (or longer) lifetime of the LHC. We believe that it is important to do so in a way that is most likely, in the long run, to increase the number of such theorists at US Universities -- especially the number in faculty positions.

As an alternative to Ian Hinchliffe and MIchael Barnett's proposal, therefore, we suggest that the initiative fund Feynman Graduate and Postdoctoral Fellowships which are aimed at providing salary support for the fellows and therefore have the best chance of actually increasing the number of supported researchers doing LHC-related physics. We propose the following terms:

1. Feynman Postdoctoral Fellowships: 3 yr term, $50K/yr == $150K total

The nomination/application (including three or more recommendation letters) should come from an individual in collaboration with a university, and should address the proposed research and any "broader impacts" (including education and outreach). While the nomination would come from a combination of an individual and an institution, the award should follow the individual. In particular if a fellow were to receive a faculty job during their fellowship period, the balance of the fellowship funds should follow the individual to be used to support his/her research.

The specific distribution of funds between salary (and fringe benefits) and any operations (such as travel) should be specified in the proposal. The award should carry no overhead, and forgoing overhead represents a minimum level of University "buy-in." An individual can receive at most one postdoctoral award. The nominating institution should specify a faculty advisor -- and each faculty advisor can endorse at most one nomination per year.

2. Feynman Graduate Fellowships: 1 yr term, $25K

The nomination/application (including three or more recommendation letters) should come from an individual in collaboration with a university, and should address the proposed research. While the nomination would come from a combination of an individual and an institution, the award should follow the individual. In particular if a fellow were to receive a postdoctoral position during their fellowship period, the balance of the fellowship funds should follow the individual to be used to support his/her research.

The specific distribution of funds between salary (and tution or fringe benefits) and any operations (such as travel) should be specified in the proposal. The award should carry no overhead, and forgoing overhead represents a minimum level of University "buy-in." It is anticipated that the successful nominations will be for students who have already demonstrated accomplishment in LHC-related theory -- and therefore most awards will likely serve as "dissertation fellowships" for senior students -- however there should be a lifetime limit of two graduate awards per individual. The nominating institution should specify a faculty advisor -- and each faculty advisor can endorse at most one nomination per year.

Again, in addition to funding LHC-related research, it is anticipated that the award of such a Feynman Graduate Fellowship would enhance the marketability of the most talented graduate students involved in LHC-related theoretical physics.

Some comments:

A. If one were to award 5 postdoctoral fellowships and 6 graduate fellowships per year for three years, the total cost would be $2.7M spread over a total of five years.

B. The awards should be selected by an appropriately constructed "management committee," as suggested by Hinchliffe and Barnett. The University award model similar to that used by NSF to distribute ATLAS funds through Columbia would be appropriate.

C. The award process, at least for the postdoctoral recipients, should be complete early in the usual postdoctoral application cycle -- i.e. by mid-November. This way the process will have the greatest impact on postdoctoral and, hopefully, faculty hiring.

Endorsements:

Andreas Birkedal
Giacomo Cacciapaglia
Mu-Chun Chen
Hsin-Chia Cheng
Sekhar Chivukula
Csaba Csaki
Keith Dienes
Bogdan Dobrescu
Joshua Erlich
Tony Gherghetta
Christophe Grojean
Graham Kribs
Konstantin Matchev
Guido Marandella
Hitoshi Murayama
Takemichi Okui
Maxim Perelstein
Pierre Ramond
Michele Redi
Matthew Schwartz
Marc Sher
Yuri Shirman
Elizabeth H. Simmons
John Terning
Arkady Vainshtein
Scott Willenbrock