The first search for scalar leptoquarks produced in $\tau$-lepton-quark collisions is presented. It is based on a set of proton-proton collision data recorded with the CMS detector at the LHC at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$. The reconstructed final state consists of a jet, significant missing transverse momentum, and a $\tau$ lepton reconstructed through its hadronic or leptonic decays. Limits are set on the product of the leptoquark production cross section and branching fraction and interpreted as exclusions in the plane of the leptoquark mass and the leptoquark-$\tau$-quark coupling strength.

A search for long-lived particles (LLPs) decaying in the CMS muon detectors is presented. A data sample of proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$ recorded at the LHC in 2016-2018, is used. The decays of LLPs are reconstructed as high multiplicity clusters of hits in the muon detectors. In the context of twin Higgs models, the search is sensitive to LLP masses from 0.4 to 55 GeV and a broad range of LLP decay modes, including decays to hadrons, $\tau$ leptons, electrons, or photons. No excess of events above the standard model background is observed. The most stringent limits to date from LHC data are set on the branching fraction of the Higgs boson decay to a pair of LLPs with masses below 10 GeV. This search also provides the best limits for various intervals of LLP proper decay length and mass. Finally, this search sets the first limits at the LHC on a dark quantum chromodynamic sector whose particles couple to the Higgs boson through gluon, Higgs boson, photon, vector, and dark-photon portals, and is sensitive to branching fractions of the Higgs boson to dark quarks as low as 2 $\times$ 10$^{-3}$.

A measurement of the Higgs boson mass and width via its decay to two Z bosons is presented. Proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$ at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV is used. The invariant mass distribution of four leptons in the on-shell Higgs boson decay is used to measure its mass and constrain its width. This yields the most precise single measurement of the Higgs boson mass to date, 125.04 $\pm$ 0.12 GeV, and an upper limit on the width $\Gamma_\mathrm{H}$$\lt$ 330 MeV at 95% confidence level. A combination of the on- and off-shell Higgs boson production decaying to four leptons is used to determine the Higgs boson width, assuming that no new virtual particles affect the production, a premise that is tested by adding new heavy particles in the gluon fusion loop model. This result is combined with a previous CMS analysis of the off-shell Higgs boson production with decay to two leptons and two neutrinos, giving a measured Higgs boson width of 3.0 $^{+2.0}_{-1.5}$ MeV, in agreement with the standard model prediction of 4.1 MeV. The strength of the off-shell Higgs boson production is also reported. The scenario of no off-shell Higgs boson production is excluded at a confidence level corresponding to 3.8 standard deviations.

A search for resonances in top quark pair ($\text{t}\bar{\text{t}}$) production in final states with two charged leptons and multiple jets is presented, based on proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV, corresponding to 138 fb$^{-1}$. The analysis explores the invariant mass of the $\text{t}\bar{\text{t}}$ system and two angular observables that provide direct access to the correlation of top quark and antiquark spins. A significant excess of events is observed near the kinematic $\text{t}\bar{\text{t}}$ threshold compared to the nonresonant production predicted by fixed-order perturbative quantum chromodynamics (pQCD). The observed enhancement is consistent with the production of a color-singlet pseudoscalar ($^1$S$^{[1]}_0$) quasi-bound toponium state, as predicted by nonrelativistic quantum chromodynamics. Using a simplified model for $^1$S$^{[1]}_0$ toponium, the cross section of the excess above the pQCD prediction is measured to be 8.8 $^{+1.2}_{-1.4}$ pb.

This paper presents a search for a Higgs boson produced in association with a charm quark (cH) which allows to probe the Higgs-charm Yukawa coupling strength modifier $κ_\mathrm{c}$. Higgs boson decays to a pair of W bosons are considered, where one W boson decays to an electron and a neutrino, and the other \PW boson decays to a muon and a neutrino. The data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$, were collected between 2016 and 2018 with the CMS detector at the LHC at a center-of-mass energy of $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV. Upper limits at the 95% confidence level (CL) are set on the ratio of the measured yield to the standard model expectation for cH production. The observed (expected) upper limit is 1065 (506). When combined with the previous search for cH in the diphoton decay channel of the Higgs boson, the limits are interpreted as observed (expected) constraints at 95% CL on the value of $κ_\mathrm{c}$, $\lvertκ_\mathrm{c}\rvert$ $\lt$ 47 (51).

A search for the pair production of the lightest supersymmetric partner of the top quark, the top squark ($\tilde{\mathrm{t}}_1$), is presented. The search targets the four-body decay of the $\tilde{\mathrm{t}}_1$, which is preferred when the mass difference between the top squark and the lightest supersymmetric particle is smaller than the mass of the W boson. This decay mode consists of a bottom quark, two other fermions, and the lightest neutralino ($\tilde{\chi}^0_1$), which is assumed to be the lightest supersymmetric particle. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$ of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV collected by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC. Events are selected using the presence of a high-momentum jet, an electron or muon with low transverse momentum, and a significant missing transverse momentum. The signal is selected based on a multivariate approach that is optimized for the difference between $m(\tilde{\mathrm{t}}_1)$ and $m(\tilde{\chi}^0_1)$. The contribution from leading background processes is estimated from data. No significant excess is observed above the expectation from standard model processes. The results of this search exclude top squarks at 95% confidence level for masses up to 480 and 700 GeV for $m(\tilde{\mathrm{t}}_1) - m(\tilde{\chi}^0_1$) = 10 and 80 GeV, respectively.

A search for the production of a single top quark in association with invisible particles is performed using proton-proton collision data collected with the CMS detector at the LHC at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb$^{-1}$. In this search, a flavor-changing neutral current produces a single top quark or antiquark and an invisible state nonresonantly. The invisible state consists of a hypothetical spin-1 particle acting as a new mediator and decaying to two spin-1/2 dark matter candidates. The analysis searches for events in which the top quark or antiquark decays hadronically. No significant excess of events compatible with that signature is observed. Exclusion limits at 95% confidence level are placed on the masses of the spin-1 mediator and the dark matter candidates, and are compared to constraints from the dark matter relic density measurements. In a vector (axial-vector) coupling scenario, masses of the spin-1 mediator are excluded up to 1.85 (1.85) TeV with an expectation of 2.0 (2.0) TeV, whereas masses of the dark matter candidates are excluded up to 0.75 (0.55) TeV with an expectation of 0.85 (0.65) TeV.

A search is presented for a new scalar resonance, X, decaying to a standard model Higgs boson and another new scalar particle, Y, in the final state where the Higgs boson decays to a $\mathrm{b\bar{b}}$ pair, while the Y particle decays to a pair of photons. The search is performed in the mass range 240$-$100 \GeV for the resonance X, and in the mass range 70$-$800 GeV for the particle Y, using proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 132 fb$^{-1}$. In general, the data are found to be compatible with the standard model expectation. Observed (expected) upper limits at 95% confidence level on the product of the production cross section and the relevant branching fraction are extracted for the X $\to$ YH process, and are found to be within the range of 0.05$-$2.69 (0.08$-$1.94) fb, depending on $m_\mathrm{X}$ and $m_\mathrm{Y}$. The most significant deviation from the background-only hypothesis is observed for X and Y masses of 300 and 77 GeV, respectively, with a local (global) significance of 3.33 (0.65) standard deviations.

Several new physics models including versions of supersymmetry (SUSY) characterized by $R$-parity violation (RPV) or with additional hidden sectors predict the production of events with top quarks, low missing transverse momentum, and many additional quarks or gluons. The results of a search for top squarks decaying to two top quarks and six additional light-flavor quarks or gluons are reported. The search employs a novel machine learning method for background estimation from control samples in data using decorrelated discriminators. The search is performed using events with 0, 1, or 2 electrons or muons in conjunction with at least six jets. No requirement is placed on the magnitude of the missing transverse momentum. The result is based on a sample of proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV corresponding to 138 fb$^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity collected with the CMS detector at the LHC in 2016$-$2018. The data are used to determine upper limits on the top squark pair production cross section in the frameworks of RPV and stealth SUSY. Models with top squark masses less than 700 (930) GeV are excluded at 95% confidence level for RPV (stealth) SUSY scenarios.

The study of nuclei and antinuclei production has proven to be a powerful tool to investigate the formation mechanism of loosely bound states in high-energy hadronic collisions. The first measurement of the production of ${\rm ^{3}_{\Lambda}\rm H}$ in p-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm{NN}}}$ = 5.02 TeV is presented in this Letter. Its production yield measured in the rapidity interval $-1 < y < 0$ for the 40% highest multiplicity p-Pb collisions is ${\rm d} N /{\rm d} y =[\mathrm{6.3 \pm 1.8 (stat.) \pm 1.2 (syst.) ] \times 10^{-7}}$. The measurement is compared with the expectations of statistical hadronisation and coalescence models, which describe the nucleosynthesis in hadronic collisions. These two models predict very different yields of the hypertriton in charged particle multiplicity environments relevant to small collision systems such as p-Pb and therefore the measurement of ${\rm d} N /{\rm d} y$ is crucial to distinguish between them. The precision of this measurement leads to the exclusion with a significance larger than 6.9$\sigma$ of some configurations of the statistical hadronization model, thus constraining the theory behind the production of loosely bound states at hadron colliders.