Experimental constraints on the coupling of the Higgs boson to electrons

TL;DR

This paper reviews experimental constraints on the Higgs boson's coupling to electrons, highlighting current bounds and potential improvements from future measurements, especially via electron EDM and collider experiments.

Contribution

It provides the first comprehensive analysis of bounds on both real and imaginary parts of the Higgs-electron coupling, including new two-loop calculations for the electron EDM.

Findings

Electron EDM constrains the imaginary part of the coupling to less than 1.7 x 10^-2 times the SM value.

Current LHC data limits the Higgs-electron coupling to less than ~600 times the SM Yukawa coupling.

Future experiments could significantly tighten these bounds through improved EDM measurements and collider studies.

Abstract

In the standard model (SM), the coupling of the Higgs boson to electrons is real and very small, proportional to the electron mass. New physics could significantly modify both real and imaginary parts of this coupling. We discuss experiments which are sensitive to the Higgs-electron coupling and derive the current bounds on new physics contributing to this coupling. The strongest constraint follows from the ACME bound on the electron electric dipole moment (EDM). We calculate the full analytic two-loop result for the electron EDM and show that it bounds the imaginary part of the Higgs-electron coupling to be less than 1.7 x 10^-2 times the SM electron Yukawa coupling. Deviations of the real part are much less constrained. We discuss bounds from Higgs decays, resonant Higgs production at electron colliders, Higgs mediated B -> e^+ e^- decays, and the anomalous magnetic moment of the electron. Currently, the strongest constraint comes from h -> e^+ e^- at the LHC, bounding the coupling to be less than ~600 times the SM Yukawa coupling. Important improvements can be expected from future EDM measurements as well as from resonant Higgs production at a next-generation high-luminosity e^+ e^- collider.