Search for lepton-flavor violating decays of the Higgs boson in the $\mu\tau$ and e$\tau$ final states in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV

A search is presented for lepton-flavor violating decays of the Higgs boson to μτ and eτ. The dataset corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 137 fb−1 collected at the LHC in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. No significant excess has been found, and the results are interpreted in terms of upper limits on lepton-flavor violating branching fractions of the Higgs boson. The observed (expected) upper limits on the branching fractions are, respectively, BðH → μτÞ < 0.15ð0.15Þ% and BðH → eτÞ < 0.22ð0.16Þ% at 95% confidence level.