Speaker
Description
The recent discovery of the Higgs boson (h) is an affirmation of the
Standard Model (SM) of particle physics and concludes several decades of
experimental searches. However, the experimental investigation of its
properties has just begun. Current measurements of h properties permit
the fraction of h decays to Beyond-Standard-Model (BSM) particles to
be as high as approximately 30%. These exotic decays are also
well-motivated theoretically. Of particular interest is the decay of h
to one or two dark sector particles called Zd. This decay occurs in
models where h interacts with a dark sector which could have a rich and
interesting phenomenology like the SM. A dark sector could naturally
address many of the questions left unanswered by the SM. The higher rate
of h production resulting from the increased proton beam intensity and
energy of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the 2015-2018 data-taking
run – combined with strong theoretical motivation and tantalizing hints
seen in past searches – makes this decay a promising avenue for the
discovery of new physics. I will present results from analysis of the
2015-6 data-set, and present extensions and prospects of this search
using the full 2015-8 data-set.
