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A<sc>bstract</sc> A measurement of the substructure of bottom quark jets (b jets) in proton-proton (pp) collisions is presented. The measurement uses data collected in pp collisions at$$ \sqrt{s}=5.02 $$ $\sqrt{s}=5.02$ TeV, with a low number of simultaneous interactions per bunch crossing, recorded by the CMS experiment in 2017, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 301 pb⁻¹. An algorithm to identify and cluster the charged decay daughters of b hadrons is developed for this analysis, which facilitates the exposure of the gluon radiation pattern of b jets using iterative Cambridge-Aachen declustering. The soft-drop-groomed jet radius,R_g, and momentum balance,z_g, of b quark jets are presented. These observables can be used to test perturbative quantum chromodynamics predictions that account for mass effects. Because the b hadron is partially reconstructed from its charged decay daughters, only charged particles are used for the jet substructure studies. In addition, a jet fragmentation function,z_b,ch, is measured, which is defined as the distribution of the ratio of the transverse momentum (p_T) of the partially reconstructed b hadron with respect to the charged-particle component of the jetp_T. The substructure variable distributions are unfolded to the charged-particle level. The b jet substructure is compared to the substructure of jets in an inclusive jet sample that is dominated by light-quark and gluon jets in order to assess the role of the b quark mass. A strong suppression of emissions at smallR_gvalues is observed for b jets when compared to inclusive jets, consistent with the dead-cone effect. The measurement is also compared with theoretical predictions from Monte Carlo event generators. This is the first substructure measurement of b jets that clusters together the b hadron decay daughters independent of the b hadron species and decay channel. 

Abstract Despite the f₀(980) hadron having been discovered half a century ago, the question about its quark content has not been settled: it might be an ordinary quark-antiquark ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}$$ $q\overline{q}$ ) meson, a tetraquark ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}{{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}$$ $q\overline{q}q\overline{q}$ ) exotic state, a kaon-antikaon ($${{\rm{K}}}\overline{{{\rm{K}}}}$$ $K\overline{K}$ ) molecule, or a quark-antiquark-gluon ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}{{\rm{g}}}$$ $q\overline{q}g$ ) hybrid. This paper reports strong evidence that the f₀(980) state is an ordinary$${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}$$ $q\overline{q}$ meson, inferred from the scaling of elliptic anisotropies (v₂) with the number of constituent quarks (n_q), as empirically established using conventional hadrons in relativistic heavy ion collisions. The f₀(980) state is reconstructed via its dominant decay channel f₀(980) →π⁺π⁻, in proton-lead collisions recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC, and itsv₂is measured as a function of transverse momentum (p_T). It is found that then_q= 2 ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}$$ $q\overline{q}$ state) hypothesis is favored overn_q= 4 ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}{{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}$$ $q\overline{q}q\overline{q}$ or$${{\rm{K}}}\overline{{{\rm{K}}}}$$ $K\overline{K}$ states) by 7.7, 6.3, or 3.1 standard deviations in thep_T< 10, 8, or 6 GeV/cranges, respectively, and overn_q= 3 ($${{\rm{q}}}\overline{{{\rm{q}}}}{{\rm{g}}}$$ $q\overline{q}g$ hybrid state) by 3.5 standard deviations in thep_T< 8 GeV/crange. This result represents the first determination of the quark content of the f₀(980) state, made possible by using a novel approach, and paves the way for similar studies of other exotic hadron candidates. 

A<sc>bstract</sc> A search fort-channel exchange of leptoquarks (LQs) is performed in dimuon and dielectron spectra using proton-proton collision data collected at$$\sqrt{s}=13$$TeV with the CMS detector at the CERN LHC. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb⁻¹. Eight scenarios are considered, in which up or down quarks couple to muons or electrons via a scalar or vector LQ exchange, for dilepton invariant masses above 500 GeV. The LQ masses are probed up to 5 TeV, beyond a regime probed by previous pair-production and single-production searches. The differential distributions of dilepton events are fit to templates that model the nonresonant LQ exchange and various standard model background processes. Limits are set on LQ-fermion coupling strengths for scalar and vector LQ masses in the 1–5 TeV range at 95% confidence level, establishing stringent limits on first- and second-generation LQs. 

A first search for beyond the standard model physics in jet multiplicity patterns of multilepton events is presented, using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $138{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ of 13 TeV proton-proton collisions recorded by the CMS detector at the LHC. The search uses observed jet multiplicity distributions in one-, two-, and four-lepton events to explore possible enhancements in jet production rate in three-lepton events with and without bottom quarks. The data are found to be consistent with the standard model expectation. The results are interpreted in terms of supersymmetric production of electroweak chargino-neutralino superpartners with cascade decays terminating in prompt hadronic $R$ -parity violating interactions. 

A search for $\gamma H$ production is performed with data from the CMS experiment at the LHC corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $138{\mathrm{fb}}^{-1}$ at a proton-proton center-of-mass collision energy of $13\mathrm{TeV}$ . The analysis focuses on the topology of a boosted Higgs boson recoiling against a high-energy photon. The final states of $H\to b\overline{b}$ and $H\to 4\ell$ are analyzed. This study examines effective $HZ\gamma$ and $H\gamma \gamma$ anomalous couplings within the context of an effective field theory. In this approach, the production cross section is constrained to be ${\sigma }_{\gamma H}<16.4\mathrm{fb}$ at 95% confidence level (CL). Simultaneous constraints on four anomalous couplings involving $HZ\gamma$ and $H\gamma \gamma$ are provided. Additionally, the production rate for $H\to 4\ell$ is examined to assess potential enhancements in the Yukawa couplings between light quarks and the Higgs boson. Assuming the standard model values for the Yukawa couplings of the bottom and top quarks, the following simultaneous constraints are obtained: ${\kappa }_u=(0.0\pm 1.5)\times {10}^3$ , ${\kappa }_d=\left({0.0}_{-6.8}^{+6.7}\right)\times {10}^2$ , ${\kappa }_s=0_{-32}^{+30}$ , and ${\kappa }_c={0.0}_{-2.8}^{+2.3}$ . This rules out the hypothesis that up- or down-type quarks in the first or second generation have the same Yukawa couplings as those in the third generation, with a CL greater than 95%. 

A measurement of event-shape variables is presented, using a data sample produced in a special run with approximately one inelastic proton-proton collision per bunch crossing. The data were collected with the CMS detector at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $64\mathrm{\mu }{\mathrm{b}}^{-1}$ . A number of observables related to the overall distribution of charged particles in the collisions are corrected for detector effects and compared with simulations. Inclusive event-shape distributions, as well as differential distributions of event shapes as functions of charged-particle multiplicity, are studied. None of the models investigated are able to satisfactorily describe the data. Moreover, there are significant features common amongst all generator setups studied, particularly showing data being more isotropic than any of the simulations. Multidimensional unfolded distributions are provided, along with their correlations. 

Abstract Measurements in the highly Lorentz-boosted regime provoke increased interest in probing the Higgs boson properties and in searching for particles beyond the standard model at the LHC. In the CMS Collaboration, various boosted-object tagging algorithms, designed to identify hadronic jets originating from a massive particle decaying to bb̅ or cc̅, have been developed and deployed across a range of physics analyses. This paper highlights their performance on simulated events, and summarizes novel calibration techniques using proton-proton collision data collected at √(s) = 13 TeV during the 2016–2018 LHC data-taking period. Three dedicated methods are used for the calibration in multijet events, leveraging either machine learning techniques, the presence of muons within energetic boosted jets, or the reconstruction of hadronically decaying high-energy Z bosons. The calibration results, obtained through a combination of these approaches, are presented and discussed. 

Abstract We propose a neural network training method capable of accounting for the effects of systematic variations of the data model in the training process and describe its extension towards neural network multiclass classification. The procedure is evaluated on the realistic case of the measurement of Higgs boson production via gluon fusion and vector boson fusion in the$${\uptau } {\uptau } $$ $\tau \tau$ decay channel at the CMS experiment. The neural network output functions are used to infer the signal strengths for inclusive production of Higgs bosons as well as for their production via gluon fusion and vector boson fusion. We observe improvements of 12 and 16% in the uncertainty in the signal strengths for gluon and vector-boson fusion, respectively, compared with a conventional neural network training based on cross-entropy. 

A<sc>bstract</sc> This paper presents the first search for a cH signal sensitive to the coupling of the charm quark (c) to the Higgs boson (H) in the associated production of at least one charm quark with a Higgs boson decaying to two photons. The results are based on a data set of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV collected with the CMS experiment at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb⁻¹. Assuming the standard model (SM) rates for all other Higgs boson production processes, the observed (expected) upper limit at 95% confidence level on the cH signal strength is 243 (355) times the SM prediction. Under the same assumption, the observed (expected) allowed interval on the Higgs boson to charm quark coupling modifier,κ_c, is|κ_c| <38.1 (|κ_c| <72.5) at 95% confidence level.