ELECTROWEAK SYMMETRY AND ITS BREAKING

Fundamental interactions are mediated by bosonic fields, quanta of which are realized as particles. The properties of these fields typically obey certain symmetry rules. In this book we discuss the symmetry between two types of interactions — electromagnetic, which are familiar to anyone who turned on the electric lights, and weak, which govern the nuclear reactions that fuel the Sun. While there is a symmetry between these two types of interactions, it is broken. The unified theory of electroweak interactions was developed over 50 years ago. The Higgs scalar field named after one of the theorists that proposed it, is believed to be responsible for the breaking of the electroweak symmetry. Yet, it is only now after the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012 by the LHC experiments, that we can study the mechanism of the electroweak symmetry breaking. This book discusses the theoretical developments that led to the construction of this theory, the discovery and the experimental observations that need to come to fully establish the validity of the model.

Contents:

• Introduction
• Electroweak Interactions
• Electroweak Symmetry Breaking
• Higgs Boson Production and Decay
• Higgs Boson Discovery
• Higgs Boson Properties
• Couplings
• Future Measurements
• Scalar Fields Beyond the Standard Model
• Putting Things in Perspective
• Relevant Reviews

Readership: Graduate students and researchers in particle physics.

Key Features:

• Written by two active researchers and educators, who have experience in teaching such courses and guiding the cutting-edge research in this area
• Written as a textbook on the theory of electroweak interactions
• Gives a detailed view of the future measurements, thus serving as a handbook to future researchers in the field of particle physics