In this thesis, we search for the production of the Standard Model Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Collider, through its decay mode to two W bosons, which each in turn decay into a charged lepton and a neutrino. The Higgs boson is the only elementary particle predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics which has not yet been experimentally observed. The question of its existence has been the subject of a wide body of experimental and theoretical work for the past half-century. Using 4.9 fb-1 of integrated luminosity, this search is expected, on average, to exclude the Standard Model predicted Higgs boson production cross section for masses between 126 GeV/c 2 and 260 GeV/c 2 under the background-only hypothesis. We observe no statistically significant excesses in the data, and we exclude the Standard Model Higgs boson production for masses between 129 GeV/c 2 and 260 GeV/c 2 . This result represents a significant reduction of the mass region in which the Standard Model Higgs boson is allowed to exist.

Results are reported from a search for non-standard-model Higgs boson decays to pairs of new light bosons, each of which decays into the [mu]+[mu]- final state. The new bosons may be produced either promptly or via a decay chain. The data set corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 5.3 fb-1 of proton-proton collisions at √s = 7 TeV, recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC in 2011. Such Higgs boson decays are predicted in several scenarios of new physics, including supersymmetric models with extended Higgs sectors or hidden valleys. Thus, the results of the search are relevant for establishing whether the new particle observed in Higgs boson searches at the LHC has the properties expected for a standard model Higgs boson. No excess of events is observed with respect to the yields expected from standard model processes. A model-independent upper limit of 0.86±0.06 fb on the product of the cross section times branching fraction times acceptance is obtained. Finally, the results, which are applicable to a broad spectrum of new physics scenarios, are compared with the predictions of two benchmark models as functions of a Higgs boson mass larger than 86 GeV/c2 and of a new light boson mass within the range 0.25-3.55 GeV/c2.

This book describes the searches that lead to the discovery of a Higgs boson performed at CMS, one of the two main experiments at the CERN LHC. After an overview of the theory and of the CMS experiment, all search channels are described, with emphasis on the ones with the best sensitivity. The statistical methodology used to analyse and the outcomes of the searches and the discovery results are then presented in detail.

The theoretical foundations of the Standard Model of elementary particles relies on the existence of the Higgs boson, a particle which has been revealed for the first time by the experiments run at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in 2012. As the Higgs boson is an unstable particle, its search strategies were based on its decay products. In this thesis, Francesco Pandolfi conducted a search for the Higgs boson in the H → ZZ → l + l - qq Decay Channel with 4.6 fb -1 of 7 TeV proton-proton collision data collected by the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment. The presence of jets in the final state poses a series of challenges to the experimenter: both from a technical point of view, as jets are complex objects and necessitate of ad-hoc reconstruction techniques, and from an analytical one, as backgrounds with jets are copious at hadron colliders, therefore analyses must obtain high degrees of background rejection in order to achieve competitive sensitivity. This is accomplished by following two directives: the use of an angular likelihood discriminant, capable of discriminating events likely to originate from the decay of a scalar boson from non-resonant backgrounds, and by using jet parton flavor tagging, selecting jets compatible with quark hadronization and discarding jets more likely to be initiated by gluons. The events passing the selection requirements in 4.6 fb -1 of data collected by the CMS detector are examined, in the search of a possible signal compatible with the decay of a heavy Higgs boson. The thesis describes the statistical tools and the results of this analysis. This work is a paradigm for studies of the Higgs boson with final states with jets. The non-expert physicists will enjoy a complete and eminently readable description of a proton-proton collider analysis. At the same time, the expert reader will learn the details of the searches done with jets at CMS.

We present a search for a Higgs boson decaying to two W bosons in p{bar p} collisions at (square root)s = 1.96 TeV center-of-mass energy. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb−1 collected with the CDF II detector. We find no evidence for production of a Higgs boson with mass between 110 and 200 GeV/c2, and determine upper limits on the production cross section. For the mass of 160 GeV/c2, where the analysis is most sensitive, the observed (expected) limit is 0.7 pb (0.9 pb) at 95% Bayesian credibility level which is 1.7 (2.2) times the standard model cross section.

A search for the standard model Higgs boson decaying into two Z bosons with subsequent decay into a final state containing two quark jets and two leptons, H to ZZ(*) to q q-bar l-l+ is presented. Results are based on data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.6 inverse femtobarns of proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV, collected with the CMS detector at the LHC. In order to discriminate between signal and background events, kinematic and topological quantities, including the angular spin correlations of the decay products, are employed. Events are further classified according to the probability of the jets to originate from quarks of light or heavy flavor or from gluons. No evidence for the Higgs boson is found, and upper limits on its production cross section are determined for a Higgs boson of mass between 130 and 600 GeV.