Higgs Boson

This dissertation presents the search for the standard model Higgs boson and initial measurement of its properties using the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment at the Large Hadron Collider. The Higgs boson is the last predicted particle of the standard model of particle physics. Its existence was predicted in the 1960s and it has been the subject of several large physics experiments. In July of 2012, physicists at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) announced the discovery of a new particle with mass around 125 GeV. Using data from the 2011 and 2012 runs of the LHC we show the evidence for this new particle. While the discovery of this new particle is encouraging, its exact identity can only be confirmed by precision measurements of its fundamental properties. This dissertation concentrates on the decay of the Higgs boson to two Z bosons, each of which in turn decays to two observable electrons or two muons. We conduct a search for the Higgs boson in this channel, and then perform an initial measurement of the mass, couplings, and tensor structure of the newly discovered particle. The properties are shown to be consistent with a standard model Higgs boson, and the precision of the measurements of its parameters as of 2013 are presented.