Welcome to the homepage of University of Cyprus (UCY) Experimental Particle Physics group. The group, led by Profs. Fotios Ptochos and Halil Saka, is active on the energy frontier of particle physics research at the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) Experiment of the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
© CERN. Image by Sergio Cittolin, CMS-PHO-OREACH-2009-001 is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
Cyprus is a CERN associate member state, and UCY is the flagship institute for particle physics in Cyprus. The UCY Experimental Particle Physics group carries more than 30 years of research experience, including detector physics, data acquisition and triggering, software development, and data analysis, through its participation in the L3 Collaboration at LEP/CERN, the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) Collaboration at Tevatron/FNAL, and the CMS Collaboration at LHC/CERN.
Current Members
- Dr. Alexandros Attikis (Special scientist)
- Dr. Anton Stepennov (Postdoctoral associate)
- Leonidas Paizanos (PhD student)
- Christos Leonidou (PhD student)
- Ali Çoban Malyalı (PhD student)
- İbrahim Atilla (PhD student)
- Alexandros Papas (MSc student)
Alumni (click to expand/collapse)
- Prof. Panos Razis (CMS emeritus/2024)
- Konstantinos Christoforou (PhD/2024)
- Dr. Jehad Mousa (Special scientist/2024)
- Sotiroulla Konstantinou (PhD/2023 → Rutgers University, USA)
- Dr. Gouranga Kole (Postdoctoral associate/2022 → National Taiwan University, Taiwan)
- Marina Kolosova (PhD/2022 → University of Florida, USA)
- Emilios Ioannou (PhD/2020)
- Mohsan Waseem Ather (PhD/2019 → National University of Technology, Pakistan)
- Demetra Tsiakkouri (PhD/2019)
- Eleni Erodotou (PhD/2019)
- Alexandros Attikis (PhD/2012)
Fotios Ptochos has been active in HEP research, both in detector development and physics analyses since 1987. As a member of the CDF collaboration, he worked in heavy flavor and tau-lepton physics and their use in various exotic searches. After joining the CMS collaboration in 2005, he worked in B-physics and in the development of boosted top-quark tagging techniques. Prof. Ptochos currently leads a research program targeting beyond the standard model physics scenarios with charged Higgs states as well as heavy resonances in boosted hadronic signatures.
email: ptochos.fotios@ucy.ac.cy
office: UCY University Campus, FST 02 - Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, B235 (Wing Ε)
Halil Saka has joined CMS as a graduate student in 2009 and obtained his PhD in 2015. Within CMS, he has served as co-convener of the EXO Non-hadronic and SUS Leptonic/RPV analysis groups as well as the HCAL Noise working group, and he is currently serving as the HCAL Upgrade Coordinator. Since the beginning of LHC Run-2, Prof. Saka has been the lead scientist of a broad research program on BSM physics in leptonic signatures involving type-III seesaw inspired heavy fermions, vectorlike leptons, light extended Higgs sector states, as well as supersymmetric extensions of the standard model.
email: saka.halil@ucy.ac.cy
office: UCY University Campus, FST 02 - Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, B241 (Wing Ε)
Physics analysis projects
Members of our group play key roles in a variety of physics analysis efforts at the CMS Experiment, outlined below. We frequently collaborate with colleagues from institutions such as Rutgers University (USA), Brown University (USA), University of Florida (USA), Helsinki Institute of Physics (Finland), Institute of High Energy Physics (China), IISER Pune (India), and CERN.
- Searches for Charged Higgs Bosons
- Inclusive multilepton searches
- Leptoquarks with top couplings
- Searches for nonresonant DiHiggs production
- BSM physics in the jet multiplicity distributions
- Hadronic top tagging and new physics with hadronic top decays
Recent publications
- CMS Collaboration, "Review of searches for vector-like quarks, vector-like leptons, and heavy neutral leptons in proton-proton collisions at √s=13 TeV at the CMS experiment", Accepted for publication in Physics Reports, arXiv:2405.17605, CMS-EXO-23-006.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for a scalar or pseudoscalar dilepton resonance produced in association with a massive vector boson or top quark-antiquark pair in multilepton events at √s=13 TeV", Phys. Rev. D 110 (2024) 1, 012013, arXiv:2402.11098, CMS-EXO-21-018.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for a charged Higgs boson decaying into a heavy neutral Higgs boson and a W boson in proton-proton collisions at √s=13 TeV", JHEP 09 (2023) 032, arXiv:2207.01046, CMS-HIG-21-010.
- CMS Collaboration, "Inclusive nonresonant multilepton probes of new phenomena at √s=13 TeV", Phys. Rev. D 105 (2022) 11, 112007, arXiv:2202.08676, CMS-EXO-21-002.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for physics beyond the standard model in multilepton final states in proton-proton collisions at √s=13 TeV", JHEP 03 (2020) 051, arXiv:1911.04968, CMS-EXO-19-002.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for vector-like leptons in multilepton final states in proton-proton collisions at √s=13 TeV", Phys. Rev. D 100 (2019) 5, 052003, arXiv:1905.10853, CMS-EXO-18-005.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for evidence of the type-III seesaw mechanism in multilepton final states in proton-proton collisions at √s=13 TeV", Phys. Rev. Lett. 119 (2017) 22, 221802, arXiv:1708.07962, CMS-EXO-17-006.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for a charged Higgs boson in pp collisions at √s=8 TeV", JHEP 11 (2015) 018, arXiv:1508.07774, CMS-HIG-14-023.
- CMS Collaboration, "Search for a light charged Higgs boson in top quark decays in pp collisions at √s=7 TeV", JHEP 07 (2012) 143, arXiv:1205.5736 CMS-HIG-11-019.
Vacancies
Our activites are primarily funded by the University of Cyprus and The Research And Innovation Foundation. If you are interested in our programs and research, please do not hesitate to contact us!
Graduate program
We are accepting applications to our graduate programs (offered in English and Greek) as UCY Department of Physics for Fall and Spring semesters. Further information is provided on the UCY website for the PhD and MSc programs.
Postdoctoral positions
- Open: 1 postdoctoral researcher position at the CMS experiment (deadline: Feb. 28, 2025) [info/apply now]
Outreach activities and opportunities
International Masterclasses - "Hands on Particle Physics"
We organize and moderate the Cyprus edition of the yearly International Masterclasses - "Hands on Particle Physics" event, bringing students to the forefront of modern-day experimental particle physics research at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.
These Particle Physics International Masterclasses take place with participants from Cypriot high schools all around the island, together with an international network of over 10,000 other high school students from 60 countries coordinated by the International Particle Physics Outreach Group. Hosted by more than 200 universities and research centers from around the world, the International Masterclasses offer a unique chance to unravel the mysteries of matter and forces, enabling the students to step out of the classroom for a day into the fascinating world of quarks and leptons, and to perform measurements on real data collected by the particle physics experiments at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.
The Cyprus edition of International Masterclasses - "Hands on Particle Physics" event traditionally takes place over multiple days in March/April every year. Please contact us if you are a secondary school educator or a high school student, and would like to participate in this event. Further information is available in the event calendar.
Summer schools and internships
CERN and many other institutions offer exciting opportunities for undergraduate students in physics or related fields to gain hands-on experience in cutting-edge particle physics research. Please contact us if you are interested in these programs: