Ramon Miquel

Institut de Física d'Altes Energies

Experimental Sciences & Mathematics

Born in 1962 in Gelida (Barcelona). Graduated in physics in 1985 at Universitat de Barcelona (UB). PhD in experimental high-energy physics in 1989 at Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Postdoctoral stay at CERN, Geneva (Switzerland) from 1991 to 1996, mostly working on the ALEPH experiment at the LEP accelerator. "Professor Titular" at UB, 1997-2000. Moved to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley (USA) as a Career Staff Scientist in 2001, where started a transition towards observational cosmology. Since 2006, ICREA Research Professor at Institut de Física d'Altes Energies (IFAE). Associate Director of IFAE from 2008 to 2014. Director since 2015. Working mostly on the "Dark Energy Survey" (DES), "Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument" (DESI), and IFAE-led "Physics of the Accelerating Universe" (PAU) projects. All of them try to shed light into the nature of the "dark energy" that is causing the current acceleration of the expansion of the Universe.


Research interests

I am an experimental particle physicist trying to understand the ultimate building blocks of the Universe and their interactions, through both experiments involving particle accelerators and astronomical observations. Recently, my work has been mostly devoted to planning instruments  and performing observations to try to unveil the nature of the so-called "dark-energy" component of the Universe, which accounts for about 70% of the matter-energy of the Universe, counters the attractive effect of gravity on all other forms of matter and energy, and drives the current accelerated expansion of the Universe.

Selected publications

- Prat J, Sanchez C, Miquel R et al. (DES Collaboration) 2018, 'Galaxy bias from galaxy-galaxy lensing in the DES science verification data', Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 473, 1667.

- Sako M et al. (SDSS Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'The data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-II supernova survey', Publ. Astron. Soc. Pac., 130, 064002.

- Abbott TMC et al. (DES Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'Dark Energy Survey year 1 results: Cosmological constraints from galaxy clustering and weak lensing', Phys. Rev. D, 98, 043526.

- Prat J et al. (DES Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'Dark Energy Survey year 1 results: Galaxy-galaxy lensing', Phys. Rev. D, 98, 042005.

- Hoyle B et al. (DES Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'Dark Energy Survey year 1 results: Redshift distributions of the weak-lensing source galaxies', Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 478, 592.

- Gatti M et al. (DES Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'Dark Energy Survey year 1 results: Cross-correlation redshifts - methods and systematics characterization', Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 478, 2006.

- Abbott TMC et al. (DES Collaboration, including Miquel R) 2018, 'Dark Energy Survey year 1 results: A precise H0 estimate from DES Y1, BAO, and D/H data', Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 480, 3879.

Selected research activities

- Adviser of the PhD thesis "Cross-correlations in the Dark Energy Survey: from redshift distribution inference to probes of gravity with the Cosmic Microwave Background," by Pauline Vielzeuf (UAB, 26/10/2018). Grade: Excellent cum laude.

- Member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of APPEC, the Astroparticle Physics European Consortium of funding agencies.

- Spanish representative in the Management Committee of the "Dark Energy Survey" (DES) Collaboration.

- Member of the DES Publication Board, the DES Builders' Committee, and the Advisory Board to the DES Director.

- Member of the Speakers Board of the "Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument" (DESI) Collaboration.