Higgs boson physics and broken flavor symmetry – LHC phenomenology

AbstractThe LHC implications are presented of a simplified model of broken flavor symmetry in which a new scalar (a flavon) emerges with mass in the TeV range. We summarize the influence of the model on Higgs boson physics, notably on the production cross section and decay branching fractions. Limits are obtained on the flavon ϕ from heavy Higgs boson searches at the LHC at 7 and 8 TeV. The branching fractions of the flavon are computed as a function of the flavon mass and the Higgs-flavon mixing angle. We explore possible discovery of the flavon at 14 TeV, particularly via the ϕ→Z0Z0 decay channel in the 2ℓ2ℓ′ final state, and through standard model Higgs boson pair production ϕ→hh in the bb‾γγ final state. The flavon mass range up to 500 GeV could probed down to quite small values of the Higgs-flavon mixing angle with 100 fb−1 of integrated luminosity at 14 TeV