Related papers: The Mirage of the Fermi Scale
The recent announcement of a discovery of a possible Higgs-like particle -its spin and parity is yet to be determined- at the LHC with a mass of 126 GeV necessitates a fresh look at the nature of the electroweak symmetry breaking, in…
In supersymmetric extensions of the Standard Model, the Fermi scale of electroweak symmetry breaking is determined by the pattern of supersymmetry breaking. We present an example, motivated by a higher-dimensional GUT model, where a…
It is possible that the electroweak scale is low due to the fine-tuning of microscopic parameters, which can result from selection effects. The experimental discovery of new light fundamental scalars other than the Standard Model Higgs…
We study classically scale invariant models in which the Standard Model Higgs mass term is replaced in the Lagrangian by a Higgs portal coupling to a complex scalar field of a dark sector. We focus on models that are weakly coupled with the…
The rather precise knowledge of the mass of the Higgs boson and of its couplings has important consequences for the physical phenomena taking place at the Fermi scale. We analyze some of these implications in the most motivated frameworks…
The present experimental and theoretical knowledge of the physics of electroweak symmetry breaking is reviewed. Data still favor a light Higgs boson, of a kind that can be comfortably accommodated in the Standard Model or in its Minimal…
We explore the scenario in which the breaking of the electroweak symmetry is due to the simultaneous presence and interplay of a dynamical sector and an unnatural elementary Higgs. We introduce a low energy effective Lagrangian and…
We study a classically scale-invariant model in which strong dynamics in a dark sector sets the scale of electroweak symmetry breaking. Our model is distinct from others of this type that have appeared in the recent literature. We show that…
Using a four fermion interaction Lagrangian, we demonstrate that the spontaneous breaking of vector symmetries requires the existence of a light (comparing with the heavy fermion mass) scalar particle and the low energy effective theory…
Two paradigms for the origin of electroweak superconductivity are a weakly coupled scalar condensate, and a strongly coupled fermion condensate. The former suffers from a finetuning problem unless there are cancelations to radiative…
The mechanism of electroweak symmetry breaking in Little Higgs Models is analyzed in an effective field theory approach. This enables us to identify observable effects irrespective of the specific structure and content of the heavy degrees…
We propose a model of a confining dark sector, dark technicolor, that communicates with the Standard Model through the Higgs portal. In this model electroweak symmetry breaking and dark matter share a common origin, and the electroweak…
The Principle of Naturalness of small parameters of a theory is reviewed. While quantum field theories constructed from gauge fields and fermions only are natural, those containing elementary scalar fields are not. In particular the Higgs…
Recent data from cosmic ray experiments may be explained by a new GeV scale of physics. In addition the fine-tuning of supersymmetric models may be alleviated by new O(GeV) states into which the Higgs boson could decay. The presence of…
We present an economical theory of natural electroweak symmetry breaking, generalizing an approach based on deconstruction. This theory is the smallest extension of the Standard Model to date that stabilizes the electroweak scale with a…
After the Higgs boson discovery, it is established that the Higgs mechanism explains electroweak symmetry breaking and generates the masses of all particles in the Standard Model, with the possible exception of neutrino masses. The…
Depending on the Higgs-boson and top-quark masses, $M_H$ and $M_t$, the effective potential of the Standard Model can develop a non-standard minimum for values of the field much larger than the weak scale. In those cases the standard…
The first LHC run has confirmed the Standard Model as the correct theory at the electroweak scale, and the existence of a Higgs-like particle associated with the spontaneous breaking of the electroweak gauge symmetry. These lectures…
The Standard Model (SM) with a light Higgs boson provides a very good description of the precision electroweak observable data coming from the LEP, SLD and Tevatron experiments. Most of the observables, with the notable exception of the…
Recently, a new class of realistic models for electroweak symmetry breaking have been constructed, without supersymmetry. These theories have naturally light Higgs bosons and perturbative new physics at the TeV scale. We describe these…