In many models of physics beyond the Standard Model the coupling of new physics to third-generation quarks is enhanced or signatures are expected that mimic top production.
We will present a review of non-MSSM inspired searches for new physics beyond the Standard Model in final states containing top quarks or bottom quarks performed by the CMS experiment.
These include searches for heavy gauge bosons, excited quarks, sequential and vector-like top quark partners. The analyses span a range of final states, from multi-leptonic to entirely hadronic, and many use modern reconstruction and analysis techniques to reconstruct the highly boosted final states that are created in these topologies. The talk will focus on the most recent results from CMS, using the full dataset collected in proton-proton collisions at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 8 TeV.