Abstract:
The discovery of a 125 GeV Higgs-like boson in 2012 marked the end of a long search for the last remaining piece of the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics. However, many questions about this elusive particle and the true nature of Electroweak Symmetry Breaking (EWSB) still remain. In this talk I present the latest ATLAS results on a search in dileptonic final states for the Supersymmetric partner to the SM top quark, the "stop" quark, which in the theory of Supersymmetry (SUSY) is largely responsible for canceling divergent quantum corrections to the mass of the SM Higgs, helping solve the so-called hierarchy problem. Additionally, with the LHC experiments preparing for the high intensity era of the High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) and our increasingly large datasets, the prospects of using the discovered Higgs boson itself as a tool for discovery of physics beyond the SM is becoming a reality. Towards this end, I will discuss a brand new ATLAS search that I am developing which targets the pair production of Higgs bosons, with one Higgs decaying to two W bosons and the other to two b-quarks. The measurement of Higgs pair production provides a measurement of the elusive Higgs self-coupling, which determines the shape of the Higgs vacuum potential and increases our understanding of EWSB. This measurement is a long-term goal of the LHC; however, many BSM theories with extended or modified Higgs sectors can enhance the rate of Higgs pair production. If we observe Higgses being produced in pairs in the current run of the LHC then this is a clear indication of BSM physics. Prospects of both BSM and SM production of Higgs pairs in the dileptonic WWbb final state will be presented.