Abstract: The performance of identification algorithms (taggers) for hadronically decaying top quarks and W bosons in pp collisions at = 13TeV recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider is presented. A set of techniques based on jet shape observables are studied to determine a set of optimal cut-based taggers for use in physics analyses. The studies are extended to assess the utility of combinations of substructure observables as a multivariate tagger using boosted decision trees or deep neural networks in comparison with taggers based on two-variable combinations. In addition, for highly boosted top-quark tagging, a deep neural network based on jet constituent inputs as well as a re-optimisation of the shower deconstruction technique is presented. The performance of these taggers is studied in data collected during 2015 and 2016 corresponding to 36.1fb-1 for the tt and +jet and 36.7-1 for the dijet event topologies.

Abstract: We report the observation of the rare charm decay D-0 -> K-pi(+)e(+)e(-), based on 468 fb(-1) of e(+)e(-) annihilation data collected at or close to the center-of-mass energy of the (sic)(4S) resonance with the BABAR detector at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. We find the branching fraction in the invariant mass range 0.675 < m(e(+)e(-)) < 0.875 GeV/c(2) of the electron-positron pair to be B(D-0 -> K-pi(+)e(+)e(-)) = (4.0 +/- 0.5 +/- 0.2 +/- 0.1) x 10(-6), where the first uncertainty is statistical, the second systematic, and the third due to the uncertainty in the branching fraction of the decay D-0 -> K-pi(+)pi(+)pi(-) used as a normalization mode. The significance of the observation corresponds to 9.7 standard deviations including systematic uncertainties. This result is consistent with the recently reported D-0 -> K-pi(+)mu(+)mu(-) branching fraction, measured in the same invariant mass range, and with the value expected in the standard model. In a set of regions of m(e(+)e(-)), where long-distance effects are potentially small, we determine a 90% confidence level upper limit on the branching fraction B(D-0 -> K-pi(+)e(+)e(-)) < 3.1 x 10(-6).

Abstract: Results of a search for the pair production of photon-jets-collimated groupings of photons-in the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider are reported. Highly collimated photon-jets can arise from the decay of new, highly boosted particles that can decay to multiple photons collimated enough to be identified in the electromagnetic calorimeter as a single, photonlike energy cluster. Data from proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 36.7 fb(-1), were collected in 2015 and 2016. Candidate photon-jet pair production events are selected from those containing two reconstructed photons using a set of identification criteria much less stringent than that typically used for the selection of photons, with additional criteria applied to provide improved sensitivity to photon-jets. Narrow excesses in the reconstructed diphoton mass spectra are searched for. The observed mass spectra are consistent with the Standard Model background expectation. The results are interpreted in the context of a model containing a new, high-mass scalar particle with narrow width, X, that decays into pairs of photon-jets via new, light particles, a. Upper limits are placed on the cross section times the product of branching ratios sigma x B(X -> aa) x B(a -> gamma gamma)(2) for 200 GeV < m(X) < 2 TeV and for ranges of m(a) from a lower mass of 100 MeV up to between 2 and 10 GeV, depending upon m(X). Upper limits are also placed on sigma x B(X -> aa) x B(a -> 3 pi(0))(2) for the same range of m(X) and for ranges of m(a) from a lower mass of 500 MeV up to between 2 and 10 GeV.

Abstract: We analyze the sensitivity of hadronic tau decays to nonstandard interactions within the model-independent framework of the standard model effective field theory. Both exclusive and inclusive decays are studied, using the latest lattice data and QCD dispersion relations. We show that there are enough theoretically clean channels to disentangle all the effective couplings contributing to these decays, with the tau -> pi pi nu(tau) channel representing an unexpected powerful new physics probe. We find that the ratios of nonstandard couplings to the Fermi constant are bound at the subpercent level. These bounds are complementary to the ones from electroweak precision observables and pp -> tau nu(tau) measurements at the LHC. The combination of tau decay and LHC data puts tighter constraints on lepton universality violation in the gauge boson-lepton vertex corrections.

Abstract: We propose a new interpretation of Peccei-Quinn symmetry within the Standard Model, identifying it with the axial B+L symmetry i.e. U (1)(PQ) equivalent to U (1)(gamma 5)(B+L). This new interpretation retains all the attractive features of Peccei-Quinn solution to strong CP problem but in addition also leads to several other new and interesting consequences. Owing to the identification U (1)(PQ) equivalent to U (1)(gamma 5)(B+L) the axion also behaves like Majoron inducing small seesaw masses for neutrinos after spontaneous symmetry breaking. Another novel feature of this identification is the phenomenon of spontaneous (and also chiral) proton decay with its decay rate associated with the axion decay constant. Low energy processes which can be used to test this interpretation are pointed out.