The EPS – HEPP Conference was held in Vienna, Austria from 22 to 29 of July, 2015, with about 700  participants. The organisation committee, chaired by Prof. Thomas Lohse, did a perfect job from every aspect.

The first results from the LHC Run 2 at 13 TeV attracted a lot of interest. The status and the perspective of the machine were discussed (about 100 pb^-1 of integrated luminosity was delivered at the time of the conference) together with the first data from ATLAS, CMS and LHCb.

Moreover, a review of the impressive results from Run 1 was made including the status of the study of Higgs properties, the search for additional Higgs-like states as well as for physics beyond the Standard Model, the study of top quark final states and heavy flavour processes.

Of special interest is the search for heavy resonances in lepton pairs, di-jets, two-photons or VV (where V = W or Z). Excesses at the level of 2 to 2.5 standard deviations in the VV channel at around 2 TeV were reported by both ATLAS and CMS. This is clearly something to be closely followed with the early Run 2 data: if the effect is real, it should show up already this year.

A few anomalies in the flavour sector were extensively discussed both from the theoretical and experimental point of view. Examples are the B → K^*μ⁺μ^- tension with the prediction of the Standard Model, which however is affected by hadronic corrections that are not easy to control;  the apparent violation of lepton universality in B⁺ → K⁺l⁺l^-, with l = e or μ (if confirmed, this signal cannot be attributed to theoretical ambiguities); and the discrepancy in B → D^(*) τ ν_τ with respect to the Standard Model predictions observed by BaBar, Belle and LHCb.

The difference between the inclusive and exclusive determinations of the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix elements |V_ub| remains a puzzle, after the new LHCb result is aligned with the exclusive measurement. Finally, it has been confirmed by new studies, both on the lattice and in the large N expansion, that the experimental result of ε’/ε for CP violation in K decay is not yet satisfactorily understood.

The LHCb experiment reported the observation of two narrow resonances in the Λ_b → J/ψK^- p channel at masses of around 4380 MeV and 4450 MeV (with widths of 205 and 39 MeV and spin-parity (3/2^-, 5/2⁺), (3/2⁺, 5/2^-) or (5/2⁺, 3/2^-), respectively) compatible with a pentaquark (u cbar c u d) structure.

Another important chapter of LHC physics is the heavy ion collisions studied by the ALICE, the dedicated experiment, but also by ATLAS and CMS, was also extensively covered.

At present, the origin of Dark Matter remains one of the most crucial problems in particle physics. The status of the experiments for its detection both at the LHC and by other direct searches has been comprehensively reviewed.

It is realized that cosmology and particle physics are coming more and more closely together. The 2015 release of Planck data has improved neutrino counting (fully compatible with 3 thermalized neutrino species) and given a stringent limit on the total mass of such neutrinos (Σm_ν< 0.23 eV at 95% CL). The study of cosmic rays is making great progress and the PeV energy neutrino events from IceCube have recently added a new chapter to the field.

The hottest issues in the physics of neutrino masses and mixing were reviewed. A great experimental effort is being devoted to the search of neutrinoless double beta decay which, if found, would prove that neutrinos have Majorana nature, i.e. they are their own antiparticles. The absolute scale of neutrino mass and its connection with the problem of naturalness has been discussed. A very important question is the possible existence of “sterile” neutrinos (i.e., without weak interactions) and the theoretical and experimental motivations were presented together with the robust experimental programme set up to resolve this issue.

All in all, the EPS conference covered a number of hot topics in the fields of particle physics –extended to other areas– and proved the robustness of the field especially in the light of Run 2 and new experiments. We are looking forward to the next edition that will hopefully point to new directions in our research.