Department of
Physics

Sourabh Dube is an experimental particle physicist working on the CMS experiment at the LHC at CERN. He obtained his PhD in experimental particle physics in 2008 from Rutgers University working on the CDF experiment. He was a Chamberlain Fellow at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with the ATLAS group before joining IISER Pune in 2013. 

Research

Experimental particle physics

Particle physics is the study of the fundamental particles in our universe and their interactions. Our best understanding of these fundamental particles and interactions is encapsulated by the standard model of particle physics. Prof. Sourabh Dube works on searches for new phenomena not described by the standard model using the proton-proton collision data collected at the LHC by the CMS experiment.

The focus is on searches using leptons in the final state. Leptonic final states are rare at the LHC, and provide an insight into new phenomena that are also rare. Prof. Dube is interested in model-independent searches, as this allows us to make the least assumptions about the nature of beyond standard model theories.

Prof. Dube's recent interests include machine learning and its applications to particle physics in particular. The large size of the LHC dataset and the particular challenge of finding rare phenomena requires the use of a variety of algorithms - both supervised and unsupervised. These algorithms are used for fundamental tasks such as object reconstruction and identification, as well as complex reinterpretation tasks of existing particle physics results.

Selected Publications

The CMS Collaboration (2025). 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. Phys. Rept. 1115 570-677

The CMS Collaboration (2022). Inclusive nonresonant multilepton probes of new phenomena at √s=13 TeV. Phys. Rev. D 105, 112007

The CMS Collaboration (2019). Search for vector-like leptons in multilepton final states in proton-proton collisions at √s= 13 TeV. Phys. Rev. D 100, 052003

The CMS Collaboration (2017). 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, 221802

Dube, S., Gadkari, D., and Thalapillil, A. (2017). Lepton jets and low-mass sterile neutrinos at hadron colliders. Phys. Rev. D 96 055031