Saptaparna Bhattacharya
Saptaparna Bhattacharya
Assistant Professor of Physics
Southern Methodist University, Department of Physics and Astronomy
3215 Daniel Ave, Fondren Science Building, Dallas, TX 75205
saptaparnab [at] smu [dot] edu Curriculum Vitae ↓

Research

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has thrust us into the precision realm of collider physics with its triumphant victory in achieving extraordinary accuracy in the measurement of key fundamental parameters of the Standard Model (SM). The electroweak sector of the SM, specifically the non-Abelian gauge structure, predicts the production of multiple gauge bosons in a single LHC collision event. My primary research interests lie in studying triboson and vector boson scattering processes. Both of these have only recently been observed given their low production probabilities; however, as the LHC collects more data, characterizing these processes will become integral to the precision program of collider physics. Continuing my studies in the electroweak sector, I am focused on elucidating the role of the Higgs boson in unitarizing the scattering of longitudinally polarized W-bosons.

The second thrust of my research is to benchmark and develop event generator workflows in ATLAS using state-of-the-art, GPU-enabled versions of widely used generators. Event generation is the crucial first step in any simulation workflow. In order to facilitate the precision era of collider physics, significantly greater computational resources will be necessary to implement event generation at higher accuracy. The GPU-enabled versions of these generators are highly performant, demonstrating improvements of up to an order of magnitude in computational time.

A third thrust of my research is to study the efficacy of machine learning-based inference at the global trigger as part of the upgraded ATLAS detector.

Current activities (ATLAS & CMS)

Earlier research (2008–2020)
  • First observation of VVV production (2019–2020): search for heavy triboson production in multileptonic final states with full Run 2 data; devised the five- and six-lepton selections sensitive to WZZ and ZZZ. PRL 125 (2020) 151802.
  • WWW search (2017–2019): search for W±W±W∓ production at 13 TeV, probing new physics in higher-dimensional contributions to the SM quartic couplings; first EFT interpretation in this final state. PRD 100 (2019) 012004.
  • Generator Studies convener in CMS (2017–2019): validation and integration of event generators in official CMS software releases.
  • Bayesian Blocks in HEP (2015–2016): application of the Bayesian Blocks algorithm to searches for new physics in the tails of distributions.
  • Microscopic black holes (2015–2016): search in multi-jet final states at 13 TeV; model-independent limits. PLB 774 (2017) 279.
  • SUSY with parked data (2014–2015, dissertation): search for supersymmetry in oppositely charged low-pT di-lepton final states at 8 TeV, sensitive to compressed-spectrum stop pair production via ISR-photon triggers.
  • Heavy top-like quarks (2012–2013): one of the first searches using the newly discovered Higgs boson as a probe for new physics (multilepton decay modes); performed at CERN. Published in PLB, November 2013. Also contributed 14/33/100 TeV projections for the Snowmass 2013 Community Summer Study and ECFA.
  • Charge-5/3 exotic quarks (2012–2014): same-sign dilepton search at 7 and 8 TeV. PRL, April 2014.
  • b-tagging at the LPC (2010–2011): data-driven b-tagging efficiency and scale-factor measurements during early LHC data taking. Published in JINST 8 (2013) P04013.
  • Vector-like quark phenomenology (2010–2011): discovery potential at the LHC, with Prof. Bogdan Dobrescu (Fermilab).
  • Tracker studies (2008–2010): Lorentz-angle calibration of CMS silicon strips; viability of Magnetic Czochralski silicon for the S-LHC tracker upgrade (Vienna Conference on Instrumentation, 2009).

Research group

Work in preparation

BEACON — Bottom-up EFT Analysis at Colliders and Observatories for New physics

A white paper (draft, August 2026) making the case for the Standard Model Effective Field Theory as a discovery tool spanning low-energy precision experiments, colliders, and cosmology — with a curated catalog of experiments and their public data portals, and a roadmap toward a SMEFT foundation model aligned with the DOE Genesis Mission. The companion website hosts the living experiment catalog.

Leadership

Convenerships

Editorial roles

Professional service

Professional memberships

Community planning: Snowmass, P5, and the European Strategy

Reviews

Institutional reviews led (2012–2021)
  • June 2021: “Search for new particles in events with energetic jets and large missing transverse momentum at 13 TeV”, JHEP 11 (2021) 153.
  • July 2020: “Search for a low-mass dilepton resonance in Higgs boson decays to four-lepton final states at 13 TeV”, EPJC 82 (2022) 290.
  • October 2018: “Search for an exotic decay of the Higgs boson to a pair of light pseudoscalars with two muons and two b jets at 13 TeV”, PLB 795 (2019) 398.
  • May 2018: “Search for top+photon production at 13 TeV in the muon+jets channel”, PRL 121, 221802 (2018).
  • Fall 2015: “Search for supersymmetry at 8 TeV in final states with boosted W bosons and b jets using razor variables”, PRD 93, 092009 (2016).
  • Summer 2012: “Measurement of the tt̅ production cross section at 7 TeV with lepton + jets final states”, PLB 720 (2013) 83.

Publications with significant contribution

Full publication lists: INSPIRE-HEP · ORCID · Google Scholar

Event generators

Exploration of multiboson final states

Searches for physics beyond the Standard Model

Physics objects (b-tagging)

Detector performance

Phenomenological studies and statistical analyses

Physics analysis summaries
  • Observation of heavy triboson production in leptonic final states at 13 TeV, CMS PAS SMP_19_014 (2020).
  • Search for the production of W±W±W∓ events at 13 TeV, CMS PAS SMP_17_013 (2019).
  • Search for Black Holes with Early Run 2 Data, CMS PAS EXO_15_007 (2015).
  • Sensitivity study for ECFA: heavy vector-like charge 2/3 quarks, CMS PAS FTR_13_026 (2013).
  • Inclusive search for a vector-like T quark by CMS, CMS PAS B2G_12_015 (2013).
  • Search for T5/3 top partners in same-sign di-lepton final state, CMS PAS B2G_12_012 (2013).
  • Search for a heavy partner of the top quark with charge 5/3, CMS PAS B2G_12_003 (2012).
  • b-Jet Identification in the CMS Experiment, CMS PAS BTV_11_004 (2012).
  • Performance of b-jet identification in CMS, CMS PAS BTV_11_001 (2011).
Conference proceedings
  • LHCP 2023: “Recent diboson and polarization measurements at CMS”.
  • LHCP 2020: Multiboson measurements in CMS and ATLAS, on behalf of the CMS and ATLAS collaborations.
  • ALPS 2019: Electroweak physics with multibosons at the CMS experiment, on behalf of the CMS collaboration.
  • Search for new physics in dijet and multijet final states at 13 TeV with ATLAS and CMS, on behalf of the CMS collaboration.
  • Search for Exotic Top Partners at 8 TeV, for the CMS collaboration (hep-ex:1310.2299).
  • Efficiency measurement of b-tagging algorithms developed by the CMS experiment, for the CMS collaboration (hep-ex:1110.4569).
White papers
  • Machine Learning on Heterogeneous, Edge, and Quantum Hardware for Particle Physics (ML-HEQUPP), arXiv:2602.22248.
  • Building an AI-native Research Ecosystem for Experimental Particle Physics: A Community Vision, arXiv:2602.17582.
  • The Critical Importance of Software for HEP, arXiv:2504.01050.
  • Les Houches 2023: Physics at TeV Colliders — Standard Model Working Group Report, hep-ph:2406.00708.
  • Snowmass White Paper Contribution: Electroweak Precision Physics and Constraining New Physics (Snowmass report from EF04).
  • Snowmass White Paper Contribution: Physics with the Phase-2 ATLAS and CMS Detectors, cds.cern.ch/record/2805993.
  • Snowmass White Paper Contribution: Event Generators for High-Energy Physics Experiments, hep-ph:2203.11110.
  • A standard convention for particle-level Monte Carlo event-variation weights, hep-ph:2203.08230.
  • CMS Phase-2 Computing Model, cds.cern.ch/record/2815292.
  • Prospects for a Heavy Vector-Like Charge 2/3 Quark T search at the LHC with 14 and 33 TeV (Snowmass 2013), hep-ex:1309.0026.
  • Snowmass Energy Frontier Simulations using the Open Science Grid (Snowmass 2013), hep-ex:1308.0843.

Talks

Invited talks and colloquia

Multiboson final states and effective field theories

  • “Looking for new physics at the multiboson frontier”, Fermilab Wine and Cheese seminar, March 13, 2026.
  • “Looking for new physics at the multiboson frontier”, Baylor University, December 3, 2025.
  • “Looking for new physics at the multiboson frontier”, CTEQ Fall Gathering, October 21–22, 2025.
  • “Multibosons as a portal to new physics”, seminar, University of Michigan, August 12, 2024.
  • “The road to precision: Stress-testing the Standard Model of Particle Physics” — Texas Tech University (Feb 2024), University of Kansas (Feb 2024), Southern Methodist University (Jan 2024), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Dec 2023), University at Buffalo, SUNY (Nov 2023).
  • “Looking for new physics in rare and novel processes at the Large Hadron Collider” — Wayne State University (Jun 2023), Brookhaven National Laboratory (Apr 2023), University of Wisconsin-Madison (Dec 2022), University of Alabama (Apr 2022), University of Notre Dame (Apr 2022), UC Davis (Mar 2022).
  • “An experimental overview of effective field theory exploration at the LHC” — Caltech (May 2022), University of Chicago (Feb 2022), Cornell University (Feb 2022), Northwestern University (Jan 2022), Brookhaven National Laboratory (Dec 2021), University of Mississippi (Nov 2021).
  • “Search for heavy gauge boson production at the Large Hadron Collider” — UC Davis (Mar 2022), Columbia University (Feb 2022), University of Notre Dame (Dec 2021), Southern Illinois University (Mar 2021).

Event generators

  • “Monte Carlo simulation in CMS”, LHC Physics Center, Physics Forum, July 28, 2022.
  • “Uncertainties in event generator predictions for LHC physics”, Snowmass Energy Frontier Precision QCD group, July 17, 2020.

High-Luminosity LHC and future colliders

  • “Monte Carlo simulations for Higgs factories”, FCC-ee Workshop, SLAC, December 19–20, 2024.
  • “The Higgs at the HL-LHC”, Snowmass Community Study, Seattle, July 2022.
  • “A Higgs aficionado's exploration of the High Luminosity-LHC”, Energy Frontier Workshop, Brown University, March 2022.

Searches for physics beyond the Standard Model

  • “Search for new physics in multi-particle final states with early Run 2 data at 13 TeV”, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata, March 8, 2016.
  • “Search for SUSY in low transverse momenta oppositely charged di-lepton final states with parked data” — Northwestern University (Jul 29, 2015), University of Virginia (Jul 27, 2015).
Presentations selected by the CMS and ATLAS Conference Committees

Multiboson final states

  • “Electroweak physics with dedicated EFT probes”, LPC EFT workshop@JHU, Johns Hopkins University, June 1–2 (2026).
  • “Leveraging EFTs to look for new physics in the electroweak sector at the LHC”, Mitchell Conference, Texas A&M, May 27–30, 2026.
  • “Recent multiboson measurements”, LHC Electroweak Working Group Meeting, March 31.
  • “Summary of EFT analyses in top and standard model processes”, LHC EFT Working Group Meeting, December 1–3, 2025.
  • “Looking for new physics with multi-bosons”, Brandeis University, October 8–10, 2025.
  • “Single and multiple boson production at the LHC”, Stony Brook University, September 8–12, 2025.
  • “Searches for heavy objects with ATLAS and CMS”, Mitchell Conference, Texas A&M, May 13–16, 2025.
  • “Diboson/triboson production and polarization measurements on behalf of CMS and ATLAS”, QCD@LHC, Freiburg, October 7–11, 2024.
  • “Full run2 overview of EW multiboson production in CMS”, Toulouse, September 25–27, 2024.
  • “Multibosons at ATLAS and CMS”, Moriond Electroweak Interactions & Unified Theories, La Thuile, March 2024.
  • “Vector Boson Scattering processes at the LHC”, SM@LHC, Fermilab, July 10–13, 2023.
  • “Recent diboson and polarization measurements at CMS”, LHCP 2023, Belgrade, May 22–26, 2023.
  • “Multiboson measurements at CMS”, Phenomenology Symposium, Pittsburgh, May 9–11, 2022.
  • “Searches for new physics in multi-boson events using anomalous coupling and EFT approaches”, Multi-boson Interactions (MBI), Milan, August 23–26, 2021.
  • “Multiboson Measurements in CMS and ATLAS”, LHCP 2020, May 25–30, 2020.
  • “Usage of effective field theory and anomalous gauge coupling interpretation in ATLAS and CMS”, LPC workshop: Multibosons At The Energy Frontier, July 2019.
  • “Electroweak physics with multibosons at the CMS experiment”, plenary talk, ALPS, April 2019.
  • “Search for WWW production with the CMS Detector at 13 TeV”, APS April Meeting, 2019.
  • “Recent results for charged diboson channels (including aTGCs)”, MBI, Ann Arbor, August 28–29, 2018.

Event generators

  • “Minimum Bias and Underlying Event: review of measurements and MC tuning at CMS”, MPI@LHC, Lisbon, October 11–15, 2021.
  • “Event Generation: Negative Weights, CPU Performance and Multi Threading”, Offline and Computing Week, CERN, October 22, 2021.

Detector performance

  • “The HGCAL upgrade of the CMS detector for HL-LHC”, APS DPF Meeting, August 2021.
  • “Exploring the timing capabilities of the High Granularity Calorimeter”, APS April Meeting, 2019.
  • “The High Granularity Calorimeter for the HL-LHC”, US LHC Users Organization Meeting, Fermilab, November 2–3, 2017.

Searches for physics beyond the Standard Model

  • “Searches for new physics in dijet and multijet final states with CMS and ATLAS”, ICHEP 2016, Chicago, August 3–10, 2016.
  • “Inclusive search for a vector-like T quark by CMS”, US LHC Users Organization Meeting, UW-Madison, November 6–8, 2013.
  • “T to lepton+jets and multileptons”, LPC Workshop on Exotic Top Partners, September 26–27, 2013.
  • “Search for Exotic Top Partners at 8 TeV”, DPF 2013, UC Santa Cruz, August 8–13, 2013.
  • “Search for a heavy exotic partner of the top quark with charge 5/3”, APS April Meeting, 2012.
  • “Higgs Production through Top-prime decays at the LHC”, DPF 2011, Brown University, August 8–13, 2011.

Physics objects (b-tagging)

  • “Efficiency measurement of b-tagging algorithms developed by the CMS experiment”, DPF 2011, Brown University, August 8–13, 2011.
  • “Understanding of B-Tagging at CMS”, Implications of First LHC Data, joint Berkeley-MIT workshop, MIT, August 10–13, 2010.

Awards and fellowships

Grants

Teaching & mentorship

Teaching experience

Mentorship

Outreach

In the news

Jun 2026
CMS news feature on the first search for new physics in triboson production using effective field theory, an analysis I led: “Looking for new physics at the multiboson frontier”.
Dec 2020
Selected by CMS Physics Coordination to be interviewed by Phys.Org on the discovery of the VVV process.
Dec 2020
Interview by Symmetry magazine on the discovery of heavy boson triplets.
Apr 2020
CMS press release on the observation of triboson production: “Triple Treat! CMS Observes Production of Three Massive Vector Bosons”.
Apr 2014
Fermilab Today, “Frontier Science Result: CMS” — search for new physics in same-signed di-leptonic final states.
Dec 2013
Fermilab Today, “Frontier Science Result: CMS” — first search using the Higgs boson as a probe for new physics.
Nov 2011
Fermilab Today, “CMS Result of the Week” — CMS b-quark identification effort.

Background

Employment

2024 – present
Assistant Professor, Southern Methodist University
2023 – 2024
Pre-faculty Fellow (Oct 2023–Aug 2024) and Deputy Team Leader of the CMS group (Oct 2023–Dec 2024), Wayne State University
2022 – 2025
Humboldt Fellow, DESY
2015 – 2023
Postdoctoral Research Associate, Northwestern University

Education

2009 – 2015
Ph.D. Physics, Brown University (conferred 2016). Thesis: “Search for SUperSYmmetry (SUSY) in low transverse momenta oppositely charged di-lepton final states with parked data collected at 8 TeV using the CMS detector”. Advisor: Prof. Greg Landsberg
2007 – 2009
Sc.M. Physics, Brown University
2005 – 2007
M.Sc. Physics, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras
2002 – 2005
B.Sc. Physics (Hons.), St. Xavier's College, University of Calcutta

Computing

C++, Python, Mathematica, Matlab, FeynRules · MadGraph4/5, Pythia 6 and 8 · HTML, TeX, bash · LHC grid computing · Linux, MacOS.