Alex Murphy

Alex Murphy FRSE is a British nuclear and particle astrophysicist and a professor at the University of Edinburgh. His research includes the direct detection of dark matter and nuclear astrophysics, specifically the study of explosive stellar events.

Early life and education Murphy obtained both his undergraduate and graduate degrees in physics from the University of Birmingham. He earned his doctorate in experimental nuclear physics under the supervision of Brian Fulton.

Career After completing his doctorate, Murphy conducted postdoctoral research at Ohio State University in the United States. His work there included the design of a supernova neutrino observatory and studies to determine astrophysical nuclear reaction rates, with contributions to the proposed OMNIS (Observatory for Multiflavor Neutrinos from Supernovae) experiment.

In 2021, Murphy served as a member of subpanel 9 (Physics) in the Research Excellence Framework.

Research Murphy's research is concentrated in two primary areas: dark matter detection and nuclear astrophysics. Subsequently, he and his research group joined the Large Underground Xenon (LUX) experiment and its successor, LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ). At Edinburgh, Murphy co-leads a research group working on the LZ detector, which operates underground in South Dakota. His team's contributions to LZ include research on background neutrons and searches for alternative dark matter candidates, such as axions. He leads an experimental program at CERN to measure nuclear reaction rates relevant to core-collapse supernovae. The project involves using radioactive isotopes, extracted in collaboration with the Paul Scherrer Institute, as targets in a particle beam to simulate conditions within a supernova.

Awards and honours Murphy was awarded the Lord Kelvin Award in Physics and Mathematics by the British Science Association in 2009. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) in 2021. In the same year, he received the Senior Public Engagement Medal from the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He is also a Fellow of the Institute of Physics (FInstP) and a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society (FRAS).