2000年获中国科学院高能物理研究所和瑞士联邦理工学院(Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich)联合培养博士学位。2000年至2012年在美国密歇根大学(University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)物理系工作，先后从事欧洲核子研究中心(CERN)大型正负电子对撞机(LEP)的L3实验，美国费米国立加速器实验室(Fermilab)的MiniBooNE实验和欧洲核子研究中心大型强子对撞机(LHC)的ATLAS实验的前沿研究工作。

目前主要参与CERN/LHC的ATLAS大型国际合作实验，是ATLAS实验组大批量数据处理和分析的联络人之一。通过高能带电粒子的剧烈碰撞来模拟宇宙大爆炸初期的高温高能状态，研究物质最深层次的结构和粒子之间的相互作用力，探索粒子质量的来源及宇宙的起源等基本问题。从2000年起致力于在LEP和LHC上寻找Higgs玻色子，这是粒子物理标准模型理论中唯一未被探测到的关键粒子，用来解释其它基本粒子的质量来源。2012年7月4日CERN宣布在LHC上发现Higgs，本人通过Higgs->ZZ*->4l "黄金衰变道“来寻找Higgs粒子，对Higgs玻色子的发现有重要的贡献。这项成就被美国《科学》杂志评为2012年度最重大科学发现，为2013年度诺贝尔物理学奖提供了最关键的实验证据。

2005-2009年期间，为美国密歇根大学研究小组的项目负责人(PI)参与美国费米国立加速器实验室(FNAL)的MiniBooNE实验，通过探测中微子振荡来探索超出标准模型的新物理现象。对MiniBooNE实验的事例重建和中微子振荡数据分析作出了重要贡献，研究结果发表在Physical Review Letters上，被美国物理研究所(AIP)评为2007年度十大物理学进展之一。

他早在2004年就率先把BDT方法引入到粒子物理领域，使得粒子鉴别效率比原有的人工神经网络方法有显著的提高，以第一作者或通讯作者发表了四篇系统的BDT论文。该算法已收录进CERN多变量数据分析软件包(TMVA)。这些BDT论文被十多个国际重大前沿科学实验组引用（如ATLAS、CMS、LHCb、ALICE、MiniBooNE、CDF、D0，BaBar、BES、AMS、ANTARES、 Amanda、IceCube、HESS、SDSS、DES等，参与的研究人员总数超过一万），作为主要的数据分析手段来寻找新粒子和新物理现象，已取得的重大成就包括在欧洲核子研究中心大型强子对撞机实验上发现希格斯粒子和在美国费米实验室发现单顶夸克粒子。

参与新一代大型国际直线正负电子对撞机(ILC)的预研。在国际权威物理学术期刊上发表论文300余篇 (包括国际合作组论文)，被引用10000余次。

代表性论文:

• ATLAS Collab., Evidence for the spin-0 nature of the Higgs boson using ATLAS data, Phys. Lett. B726 (2013) 120-144
• ATLAS Collab., Measurements of Higgs boson production and couplings in diboson final states with the ATLAS detector at the LHC, Phys. Lett. B726 (2013) 88-119
• ATLAS Collab., A Particle Consistent with the Higgs Boson Observed with the ATLAS Detector at the Large Hadron Collider, Science 338, 1576 (2012)
• ATLAS Collab., Observation of a new particle in the search for the Standard Model Higgs boson with the ATLAS detector at the LHC,  Phys. Lett. B 716 (2012) 1-29
• ATLAS Collab., Search for the Standard Model Higgs boson in the decay channel H->ZZ(*)->4l with 4.8 fb^-1 of pp collisions at √s =7 TeV with ATLAS,  Phys. Lett. B 710 (2012) 383-402
• ATLAS Collab., Measurement of the ZZ production cross section and limits on anomalous neutral triple gauge couplings in proton-proton collisions at √s =7 TeV with the ATLAS detector, Phys. Rev. Lett. 108 (2012) 041804
• ATLAS Collab., Measurement of the WW production cross section in proton-proton collisions at √s = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector,  Phys. Rev. Lett. 107 (2011) 041802
• ATLAS Collab., Measurement of the WZ Production Cross Section and Limits on Anomalous Triple Gauge Couplings in Proton-Proton Collisions at √s =7 TeV with the ATLAS Detector,  Phys. Lett. B709 (2012) 341-357
• ATLAS Collab., Search for the Higgs boson in the H à WW(*) à l nu l nu decay channel in pp collisions at √s = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector,  Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 111802 (2012)
• ATLAS Collab., Measurement of the W and Z production cross sections in proton-proton collisions at √s = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector, JHEP 1012 (2010) 060
• ATLAS Collab., Performance of the ATLAS Detector using First Collision Data, JHEP 1009 (2010) 056
• ATLAS Collab., The ATLAS Experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider, JINST 3:S08003 (2008) 437 pp
• H. Yang(*), T. Dai, A. Wilson, Z. Zhao, B. Zhou, A Multivariate Training Technique with Event Reweighting, JINST 3: P04004 (2008)
• MiniBooNE Collab., Unexplained Excess of Electron-Like Events From a 1 GeV Neutrino Beam, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 101802 (2009)
• MiniBooNE Collab., A Search for muon neutrino and antineutrino disappearance in MiniBooNE, Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 061802 (2009)
• MiniBooNE Collab., Measurement of Muon Neutrino Quasi-Elastic Scattering on Carbon, Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 032301 (2008)
• MiniBooNE Collab., First Observation of Coherent p⁰ Production in Neutrino Nucleus Interactions with E_n<2GeV,  Phys. Lett. B664:41-46 (2008)
• MiniBooNE Collab., A.A. Aguilar-Arevalo et.al., A Search for Electron Neutrino Appearance at the Dm² ~ 1 eV² Scale, Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 231801 (2007)
• H. Yang(*), B.P. Roe, J. Zhu, Studies of Stability and Robustness for Artificial Neural Networks and Boosted Decision Trees, Nucl. Instrum. & Meth. A 574 (2007) 342-349
• H. Yang(*), B.P. Roe, J. Zhu, Studies of boosted decision trees for MiniBooNE particle identification, Nucl. Instrum. & Meth. A 555 (2005) 370-385
• B.P. Roe, H. Yang(*), J. Zhu et.al., Boosted decision trees as an alternative to artificial neural networks for particle identification, Nucl. Instrum. & Meth. A 543 (2005) 577-584
• H. Yang(*), et.al., High-precision Absolute Distance Measurement using Dual-laser Frequency Scanned Interferometry Under Realistic Conditions, Nucl. Instrum. & Meth. A575 (2007) 395-401
• H. Yang(*), J. Deibel, S. Nyberg, K. Riles, High precision absolute distance and vibration measurement using frequency scanned interferometry, Applied Optics, Vol.44 (2005) 3937-3944
• LEP Collab., Search for the Standard Model Higgs Boson at LEP, Phys. Lett. B 565 (2003) 61-75
• L3 Collab., Search for neutral Higgs bosons of the minimal supersymmetric standard model in e+e- interactions at √s up to 209 GeV, Phys. Lett. B545 (2002) 30-42
• L3 Collab., Higgs Candidates in e⁺e^- Interactions at √s = 206.6 GeV, Phys. Lett. B 495 (2000) 18-25
• L3 Collab., Measurement of the topological branching fractions of the tau lepton at LEP, Phys. Lett. B 519 (2001) 189-198
• L3 Collab., Production of single W bosons at √s=189 GeV and measurement of WWg gauge couplings, Phys. Lett. B 487 (2000) 229-240