Description
The German Committee for Astroparticle Physics, KAT, is the elected representation of all
astroparticle physicists working at German research institutions of the Helmholtz Association, Max
Planck Society and at German universities. This paper comprises the statements of the German
astroparticle physics community to the 2020 update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics.
The three German committees for particle physics, KET, for astroparticle physics, KAT, and for
hadronic and nuclear physics, KHuK, in the last 1.5 years jointly arranged a series of workshops
where the current status and future plans for the wider scientific field were evaluated and discussed
within these three communities. KAT extracted the statements and strategic proposals relevant for
astroparticle physics from the joint declaration of these workshops and finalized this paper at its
strategy meeting with all group leaders/professors in astroparticle physics in Germany end of
November 2018.
The main research topics of astroparticle physics in Germany are the nature of neutrinos and of dark
matter, the origin of cosmic rays, and the understanding of the non-thermal Universe. The nature of
neutrinos and of dark matter are fundamental questions of particle physics that have a large overlap
with accelerator-based particle physics. Therefore, this document focuses on our vision for these
subjects as input to the European Strategy for Particle Physics.
