For the very first time, young Pakistan College Students attended IPPOG’s International Particle Physics Masterclasses. The classes took place in Habib University, Karachi, on 28 March, 2022.

The International Masterclass programme provides students with an opportunity to discover the world of quarks and leptons by performing measurements on real data from experiments and to meet active particle physics researchers/scientists. The event was managed through three main sessions, as is typical for most Masterclasses. The students started the day with introductory seminars, moved on to analysis exercises, then concluded with a videoconference moderated by experts.

As Pakistan is an active member of the CMS experiment, the students in Karachi, learned about Large Hadron Collider (LHC) physics, CMS goals and achievements, then analysed data from the experiment. In this case, their goal was to reconstruct pairs of oppositely charged particles, then to produce a plot of their mass, in order to see if they were the results of the production of neutral particles in the LHC. Not surprisingly, it seems they did make some discoveries! Most likely, this will be followed by similar discoveries by students in Islamabad and Lahore

At the end of the day, just like in a real international research collaboration, students were invited to discuss the results of the exercises together during a videoconference hosted by Fermilab. This session was followed by Q&A during which students and teachers could ask questions to Steven Goldfarb (Co-Chair of IPPOG), Pedro Abreu (Co-Chair of IPPOG), Kenneth William Cecire (Co-Coordinator of the International Masterclasses), Hamza Hanif (General Organisation of the events in Pakistan), Sameena Shah Zaman (Convener of the Masterclass session in Karachi) and Hafeez Hoorani (Pakistan physicist on CMS, national contact for Pakistan).

Thanks to the international Masterclasses, students can have a direct experience of current research. It's an exciting journey to discovering particle physics and experimenting with the analysis of real data coming from the LHC, which – we remind you – is about to start up again for Run 3.

 I hope someone from the audience has been inspired and can devote themselves to particle physics to understand the microscopic nature of the universe for the greater good. Hamza Hanif

IPPOG's goal is to introduce particle physics to young, diverse audiences, to remind students that science is a wonderful pursuit, helping to spark our natural curiosity, often giving us satisfaction, and sometimes – when we work hard - answers. For this reason, we too hope that among the young students who attended yesterday's masterclass, one of them might decide to continue to carry out research in particle physics. But, if the result was simply an enhanced understanding and appreciation of science, we are equally happy.