ATLAS search for scalar leptoquarks at √(s) = 13 TeV

In the Standard Model, there are many striking similarities between the quark and the lepton sector, like the number of families and the mass hierarchy between them. Leptoquarks are hypothetical particles that occur in various models for physics beyond the Standard Model and provide a connection between the two sectors. They are commonly assumed to couple to quarks and leptons of the same fermion generation but this need not be the case. This contribution gives an overview of the motivation for and presents important aspects of the search for scalar leptoquarks performed by the ATLAS collaboration using proton-proton collision data collected at a centre-of-mass energy of √(s) = 13 TeV.