Prof. Hildreth’s primary physics interest is in understanding the mechanism or mechanisms responsible for Electroweak Symmetry Breaking. Simply put, this would answer questions like: “why is there mass?” Prof. Hildreth is a part of the CMS Experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Geneva, Switzerland, where he and the rest of the Notre Dame High Energy Physics group played key roles in the recent discovery of a Higgs boson. His group is involved in measuring Higgs properties and using precision measurements to understand the potential impact of new physics at inaccessible mass scales from subtle effects that could be observable in the LHC data. These measurements are essential in determining if the Higgs we see is really the source of Electroweak Symmetry Breaking and the origin of particle masses, or whether new physics is required. He is also working on searches for new physics beyond the Standard Model of particle physics, specifically looking for new physics in final states involving high energy photons and, separately, for new heavy quarks.