Particle physicist, Eckhard Elsen (born in 1955, German) held many committee positions, including chairing the LHC experiments committee from 2011-2014.

After being awarded a diploma in particle physics at Hamburg University, Eckhard Elsen continued his studies and gained his doctorate in 1981.

Elsen’s research, which focused on e+e- collider particle physics, led him to several prominent post-doctoral positions at Hamburg University, Stanford University National Accelerator Laboratory, and Heidelberg University, where he made first contact with CERN as a member of the OPAL collaboration.

In 1990 Elsen was promoted to Senior Scientist for the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY), a national research centre in Germany that operates particle accelerators. During this time he became the spokesperson for the H1 experiment (an international collaboration which developed and built the H1 detector at the ep-collider HERA at DESY), and later – after a sabbatical at the BaBar experiment at Stanford – project manager for the International Linear Collider (ILC) project team at DESY – when Elsen continued his relationship with CERN.

In 2006 Elsen was made a Professor at Hamburg University, where he taught both general physics courses and accelerator physics and supervises students.

During this period, Elsen has also co-authored two books – the most recent on the physics harvest of the LHC Run 1, worked on over 450 publications in various fields and held many committee positions – including chairing the LHC experiments committee from 2011-2014.