Summer Program
From First Principles to Future Colliders: Amplitudes, Bootstraps and Energy Correlators
July 12–August 2, 2026
Organizers:
Nima Arkani-Hamed, Institute for Advanced Study
Cari Cesarotti, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Andrea Guerrieri, City St. George’s, University of London
Ian Moult, Yale University
Over the past decade, the LHC has delivered transformative results—culminating in the Higgs discovery, precision tests of QCD, and the identification of exotic hadrons—while formal quantum field theory has undergone its own revolution. New tools such as the geometric formulations of scattering amplitudes, Lorentzian conformal field theory techniques for detector operators, non-perturbative S-matrix bootstrap, and lattice methods for real-time observables are transforming our understanding of particle collisions. Yet, these advances remain largely disconnected from collider phenomenology.
This Aspen program aims to bridge that gap, bringing together experts in amplitudes, bootstrap, lattice QCD, and collider physics to forge new connections between theory and experiment. We seek to redefine precision tests of the Standard Model, explore the consequences of unitarity and analyticity on new classes of Lorentzian observables, and uncover signatures of new physics. The program will chart a path toward a next-generation collider era grounded in first-principles quantum field theory.
Summer Workshops
The summer program, running for 16 weeks from late-May to mid-September, emphasizes exciting open problems at the cutting edge. Two or three concurrent workshops, each with a specific focus selected for timeliness and the potential for breakthroughs and of two to five weeks in length, establish the main themes of each week, with twelve or thirteen different workshops each summer, balanced across fields including particle physics, string theory, astrophysics and hard and soft condensed matter physics, as well as emerging areas including biological physics, ultra-cold atom physics, quantum information, and physical mathematics. Additional researchers participate in small working groups or as individual researchers. This framework is designed to maximize informal interactions and free discussion within each area and to promote cross-fertilization between different areas via the common language of theoretical physics. Participation in the summer program of the Aspen Center for Physics is by application and subsequent invitation only. View past workshops.
