Searching for Supersymmetry in Fully Hadronic Final States with the ATLAS Experiment

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and its experiments were built to explore fundamental questions of particle physics via proton-proton collisions at unprecedented center-of-mass energies, thus providing a unique environment for testing the Standard Model (SM) at the electroweak scale and searching for signs of new physics beyond the SM (BSM). The discovery of a SM-like 125 GeV Higgs boson by ATLAS and CMS hints of new physics at the electroweak scale—possibly within reach of the LHC—in order to mitigate divergent radiative corrections to the Higgs squared mass. This can systematically be accomplished by the introduction of supersymmetry (SUSY). For the experimentalist, SUSY provides a set of simplified benchmark models, with explicit and testable predictions, which are useful when searching for BSM physics. A large number of BSM searches has been carried out at the LHC. However, no evidence for SUSY has been found. It is therefore important to expand the scope. This thesis presents two ATLAS analyses for SUSY, both utilizing fully hadronic final states. The first analysis searches for the pair production of top squarks (stops), each with R-parity-violating decays into a b- and an s-quark. This analysis was performed using proton-proton collision data with an integrated luminosity of 17.4 fb-1 at a center-of-mass energy of 8 TeV. The second analysis searches for electroweak production of a chargino-neutralino pair, decaying into SM-quarks via a W boson and a SM-like 125 GeV Higgs boson, performed using an integrated luminosity of 36.1 fb-1 at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. No evidence of an excess beyond the SM background prediction is observed in either search, thus exclusion limits are set at 95% CL. Stops decaying directly to hadronic final states are excluded for masses in the range 100 to 315 GeV. Charginos and neutralinos decaying via Wh to hadronic final states are excluded up to 680 GeV, by far the strongest limits on electroweak SUSY with Wh decays to date. The tools and strategies developed in the searches for SUSY with hadronic final states in this thesis should prove useful in future searches for BSM physics at the LHC.