Flavor Physics and the TeV Scale

ISBN-13: 9783642100871 / Angielski / Miękka / 2010 / 143 str.

Springer

Opis

The ?avor sector carries the largest number of parameters in the Standard Model of particle physics. With no evident symmetry principle behind its existence, it is not as well understood as the SU(3)SU(2)U(1) gauge interactions. Yet it tends to be underrated, sometimes even ignored, by the erudite. This is especially so on the verge of the LHC era, where the exploration of the physics of electroweak symmetry breaking at the high energy frontier would soon be the main thrust of the ?eld. Yet, the question of "Who ordered the muon?" by I. I. Rabi lingers. We do not understand why there is "family" (or generation) replication. That three generations are needed to have CP violation is a partial answer. We do not understand why there are only three generations, but Nature insists on (just about) only three active neutrinos. But then the CP violation with three generations fall far short of what is needed to generate the baryon asymmetry of the Universe. We do not understand why most fermions are so light on the weak symmetry breaking scale (v. e. v. ), yet the third-generation top quark is a v. e. v. scale particle. We do not understand why quarks and leptons look so different, in particular, why neutrinos are rather close to being massless, but then have (at least two) near maximal mixing angles. We shall not, however, concern ourselves with the neutrino sector. It has a life of its own.

Spis treści

Violation in Charmless Transitions.- Mixing and.- Probes: and.- Electroweak Penguin: Vertex, #x02032;, Dark Matter.- Right-Handed Currents and Scalar Interactions.- Bottomonium Decay and New Physics.- and Systems: Box and EWP Redux.- Lepton Number Violating #x003BC; and #x003C4; Decay.- Discussion and Conclusion.

Blurb

This monograph treats the effectiveness of useing flavor physics in offering probes of the TeV scale, while providing a timely interface during the emerging LHC era. By concentrating only with the TeV-scale connection, a large part of the B factory output can be bypassed, and emphasis is placed on loop-induced processes, i.e. virtual, quantum processes that probe TeV-scale physics. The experimental perspective is taken, resulting in selecting processes, rather than the theories or models, as the basis to exploration. Two-thirds of the book is therefore concerned with b -> s or bs <-> sb transitions. The guiding principle is: unless it can be identified as the smoking gun, it is better to stick to the simplest, rather than elaborate, explanation of an effect that may call for New Physics. By focusing on heavy flavor as a probe of TeV-scale physics, technicalities can be employed to unveil their beauty, without getting ensnared in them, while aiming for the deeper, higher-scale physics that such probes provide.

This tract originated from a plenary talk at the SUSY 2007 conference in Karlsruhe, Germany.