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Subatomic Heroes

Anshika Bansal, Guido Bell, Aritra Biswas, Diptaparna Biswas, Anastasia Boushmelev, Carsten Busse, Markus Cristinziani, Carmen Diez Pardos, Qader Dorosti, Sebastian Edelmann, Thorsten Feldmann, Ivor Fleck, Jan Hahn, Dennis Horstmann, Tobias Huber, Jack Jenkins, Wolfgang Kilian, Danny Koschwitz, Nils Krengel, Martin Lang, Björn Lange, Alexander Lenz, Eleftheria Malami, Thomas Mannel, Ilija Milutin, Ali Mohamed, Denise Müller, Jakob Müller, Marcus Niechciol, Jaime del Palacio Lirola, Chiara Papior, Arwen Pieck, Thomas Reppel, Markus Risse, Elisabeth Schopf, Noah Siegemund, Tobias Striegl, Gilberto Tetlalmatzi-Xolocotzi, Tom Tong, Jette Vedder, Katharina Voß, Daniel Vladimirov, Wolfgang Walkowiak, Oliver Witzel, Zachary Wüthrich, Christof Wunderlich, Michael Ziolkowski

TL;DR

Subatomic Heroes is an outreach initiative from the University of Siegen that translates particle physics into public-friendly formats. It integrates art, theater, school programs, and social media to attract students, spark youth interest, and educate the general public, leveraging local research strengths in particle physics and quantum optics. Key contributions include hands-on school activities (Rent a Prof, KinderUni, CERN Masterclasses), science theatre (Physik im Apollo), and interactive demonstrations (the 'hadronic ice-cream'), as well as podcasts and brochures. The work demonstrates how cohesive, multi-channel outreach can broaden participation in fundamental physics and complement research activity.

Abstract

Sharing the amazing achievements of the (particle) physics world with the general public is at the heart of the mission of the Subatomic Heroes, based at the University of Siegen, Germany. Originally this started out as an endeavor of theoretical particle physics, now we are steadily spreading out to cover and include more branches of physics and science. Our activities range from merging art with public physics lectures via marvelous artistic performances at the local theater, over dedicated events for high-school students, to our Subatomic Heroes channel on Instagram and TikTok where you may also find out when and where our famous "hadronic ice-cream" will be served next! So follow us on https://www.instagram.com/subatomic_heroes and https://www.tiktok.com/@subatomic_heroes.

Subatomic Heroes

TL;DR

Subatomic Heroes is an outreach initiative from the University of Siegen that translates particle physics into public-friendly formats. It integrates art, theater, school programs, and social media to attract students, spark youth interest, and educate the general public, leveraging local research strengths in particle physics and quantum optics. Key contributions include hands-on school activities (Rent a Prof, KinderUni, CERN Masterclasses), science theatre (Physik im Apollo), and interactive demonstrations (the 'hadronic ice-cream'), as well as podcasts and brochures. The work demonstrates how cohesive, multi-channel outreach can broaden participation in fundamental physics and complement research activity.

Abstract

Sharing the amazing achievements of the (particle) physics world with the general public is at the heart of the mission of the Subatomic Heroes, based at the University of Siegen, Germany. Originally this started out as an endeavor of theoretical particle physics, now we are steadily spreading out to cover and include more branches of physics and science. Our activities range from merging art with public physics lectures via marvelous artistic performances at the local theater, over dedicated events for high-school students, to our Subatomic Heroes channel on Instagram and TikTok where you may also find out when and where our famous "hadronic ice-cream" will be served next! So follow us on https://www.instagram.com/subatomic_heroes and https://www.tiktok.com/@subatomic_heroes.
Paper Structure (5 sections, 4 figures)

This paper contains 5 sections, 4 figures.

Table of Contents

  1. Motivation
  2. Attract Students
  3. Sparking Pupils' Interest
  4. General Public
  5. Summary

Figures (4)

  • Figure 1: The logo of the Subatomic Heroes. The black contours of our superhero depicts actually a peculiar elementary particle process: the decay of e.g. a $b$-quark into a $s$-quark and a muon and anti-muon pair - a so-called electro-weak penguin diagram. Interestingly we find for more than 10 years some discrepancies between experimental measurements and theoretical expectations of these process. Maybe our superhero lies at the heart of some future exciting discoveries in physics.
  • Figure 2: Screenshots of our Instagram channel (left), TikTok channel (center), and sample pages from our brochure "Elementarteilchenphysik" (right).
  • Figure 3: Left: "Rent a Prof" program organized by our Faculty IV, University of Siegen, center: "University for Children", and right: flyer for our high school student competition celebrating CERN's 70th anniversary.
  • Figure 4: The left panel shows our "Physik im Apollo" 2025 poster, the right panel our hadronic ice-cream menu.