Future prospects of experimental facilities for charm physics studies

Over the past 50 years, charm physics studies that focused on particles containing charm quarks (such as charm mesons, charm baryons, and charmonium states), have uncovered profound laws of strong and weak interactions and provided a unique window for exploring new physics. As the only“up-type”quark capable of forming bound states and studying weak decays, charm quarks rely on accelerator experiments, primarily conducted through facilities like BESⅢ, BelleⅡ, and LHCb. Looking ahead, charm physics will leverage next-generation high-luminosity experimental facilities, including China’s Super Tau-Charm Facility (STCF) and the Circular Electron-Positron Collider (CEPC). These two facilities will complement each other: STCF will focus on systematic studies in the low-energy regime, while CEPC will extend the phase space at high energies, jointly advancing breakthroughs in strong interaction theory, matter-antimatter asymmetry, and the nature of exotic states. This article outlines the design concepts of these future large-scale scientific projects and highlights recent progress. These cutting-edge facilities will not only serve as platforms for exploring the origin of matter and fundamental interactions in particle physics but also drive technological innovation, opening new chapters in humanity’s understanding of the universe.