Introduction to Electroweak Symmetry Breaking

Abstract

An introduction to the physics of electroweak symmetry breaking is given. We discuss Higgs boson production in $e^+e^-$ and hadronic collisions and survey search techniques at present and future accelerators. Indirect limits on the Higgs boson mass from triviality arguments, vacuum stability, and precision electroweak measurements are presented. An effective Lagrangian, valid when there is no low mass Higgs boson, is used to discuss the physics of a strongly interacting electroweak symmetry breaking sector. Finally, the Higgs bosons of the minimal supersymmetric model are considered, along with the resulting differences in phenomenology from the Standard Model.