Divisions

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY
A Research Centre of the Helmholtz Association

Still on top after about three decades

Abideh Jafari (DESY)
Auditorium (DESY Hamburg) and Zoom, 13:00h

The top quark continues to be appealing to high energy physicists even though its discovery was 30 years ago. The heaviest known particle has still a number of aspects to scrutinize, while it might be “the portal” to new theories that address the shortcomings of the standard model (SM) of particle physics. The wealth of LHC data at the highest-ever-reached energies provides a handful of events where top quarks are produced with multiple other heavy (or light) particles. We are in an era where, for the first time, top quark interactions can be measured directly and without strong assumptions on the underlying theory. I will go through a number of measurements targeting top quark electroweak interactions, and discuss how we are putting different pieces together towards a more complete picture of the SM top sector. Alongside this effort, I will point out other corners of the SM where different new phenomena might be routed in the same theory, going beyond what we know.