Xilin Liang, a graduate student working with Kenneth Barish, a professor of physics and astronomy at UC Riverside, has been awarded a RHIC & AGS merit award by Brookhaven National Laboratory for his “contributions to the STAR forward calorimeter and simulations for the EIC.”

The Electron-Ion Collider, or EIC, is a planned major new nuclear physics research facility at Brookhaven National Lab in Upton, New York, that will explore mysteries of the “strong force” that binds the atomic nucleus together. Electrons and ions, sped up to almost the speed of light, will collide with one another in the EIC.

The Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider, or RHIC, is an accelerator designed to collide intersecting beams of heavy ions in the search for a state of matter called quark-gluon plasma. The Alternating Gradient Synchrotron, or AGS, is one of the world’s premiere particle accelerators.

“This is a very prestigious recognition of ‘exceptional Students and Scientists who are within 10 years of receiving their Ph.D., and have conducted outstanding research in either theory or experiment related to the RHIC Complex,’” Barish said.

Liang, who last June was awarded the UCR Department of Physics and Astronomy’s “2023 Anne Kernan Award – Outstanding Senior Graduate Student Researcher,” is stationed at Brookhaven National Lab.