Physicist-in-Training Chosen for Prestigious SPARC Program to Illuminate the Secrets of Neutrinos
HOUSTON, Oct. 28 – A University of Houston graduate student will soon begin an important mission to help explain one of the universe’s most puzzling particles – the neutrino.
Karim Hassinin, a Ph.D. candidate in physics at UH, has been selected for the 2025 Science Policy and Advocacy for Research Competition, or SPARC, a prestigious 10-week program hosted by the Universities Research Association designed to equip scientists with essential communication skills to help them translate complex research into clear messages for non-technical audiences.
“I’ve always been fascinated by how we extract information from reality — even when we can’t fully define what reality is,” Hassinin said. “Theory, at its core, is a kind of storytelling, and every model is just one way of seeing the world. Through this program, I hope to learn how to translate those complex layers of scientific reasoning into stories that anyone can understand — so people can see not just the data, but the wonder behind discovery.”
The SPARC of an Idea
SPARC is designed to enhance awareness of the policy engagement process for early career scientists. Through seminars, workshops and individual sessions with science policy experts, students develop research and communication skills to build their science policy portfolios. The program culminates in a competition with SPARC champions attending the Science Policy Summit in Washington, D.C.
In addition to SPARC, Hassinin spent this past summer at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory as a URA Visiting Scholar, collaborating on research for the Short Baseline Neutrino ICARUS program, and contributed to the development of large-scale projects such as the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment.
A Truly Puzzling Particle
The focus of this year’s SPARC is on neutrinos – tiny, neutral particles that rarely interact with matter. Though difficult to detect, they are the most abundant massive particles in the universe, produced in natural and man-made processes like stars and nuclear reactors.
Yet, they remain one of the greatest mysteries in physics.
Scientists are still working to determine their mass, how they interact with matter and whether they hold clues to why the universe is made of matter rather than antimatter – key questions being explored at Fermilab, the U.S. Department of Energy’s premier laboratory for high-energy particle physics.
Hassinin’s research involves using computer simulations to study how neutrinos interact with different materials, based on ideas from physics theories.
“We tell the generator how many neutrinos we want to use, what type of neutrino and what material we want the neutrino to interact with,” said Hassinin. “This work is just one piece out of many that are trying to understand neutrino interactions. Without neutrino interactions, we don’t know anything about neutrinos. We must understand something deeply before we can understand how to apply it.”
A New Way of Thinking
During his first year of graduate school, Hassinin taught an undergraduate physics lab and saw that the students had different perspectives, forcing him to rethink the ways he needed to explain the material.
“The technical details will always be there, but it’s essential to show people the purpose of science and how it shapes our world,” Hassinin said. “Our daily lives depend on technology and technology depends on science. Through SPARC, I’ve gained a new perspective on how vital it is to bridge the gap between complex research and public understanding — because science communication truly matters everywhere.”