Gauge Theory of Weak Decays The Standard Model and the Expedition to New Physics Summits

This is the first advanced, systematic and comprehensive look at weak decays in the framework of gauge theories. Included is a large spectrum of topics, both theoretical and experimental. In addition to explicit advanced calculations of Feynman diagrams and the study of renormalization group strong interaction effects in weak decays, the book is devoted to the Standard Model Effective Theory, dominating present phenomenology in this field, and to new physics models with the goal of searching for new particles and interactions through quantum fluctuations. This book will benefit theorists, experimental researchers, and Ph.D. students working on flavour physics and weak decays as well as physicists interested in physics beyond the Standard Model. In its concern for the search for new phenomena at short distance scales through the interplay between theory and experiment, this book constitutes a travel guide to physics far beyond the scales explored by the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

Preface; Acknowledgments; Abbreviations; Introduction; Part I. Basics of Gauge Theories: 1. Fundamentals; Part II. The Standard Model: 2. The Standard Model of electroweak and strong interactions; Part III. Weak Decays in the Standard Model: 3. Weak decays at tree level; 4. Technology beyond trees; 5. Short distance structure of weak decays; 6. Effective Hamiltonians for FCNC processes; 7. Non-perturbative methods in weak decays; 8. Particle-antiparticle mixing and CP violation in the Standard Model; 9. Rare B and K decays in the Standard Model; 10. e'/e in the Standard Model; 11. Charm flavour physics; 12. Status of flavour physics within the Standard Model; Part IV. Weak Decays beyond the Standard Model: 13. First steps beyond the Standard Model; 14. Standard Model Effective Theory; 15. Simplest extensions of the SM; 16. Specific models; 17. Beyond quark flavour physics; 18. Grand summary of new physics models; 19. Flavour expedition to the Zeptouniverse; 20. Summary and shopping list; Appendix A. Dirac algebra, spinors, Pauli and Gell-Mann matrices; Appendix B. Feynman rules of the Standard Model; Appendix C. Massive loop integrals; Appendix D. Numerical input; Appendix E. Analytic solutions to SMEFT RG equations; References; Index.

Andrzej J. Buras is one of the most cited particle theorists in Europe and the most cited theoretical flavour physicist worldwide. He has written extensively on weak decays through lecture notes and review articles. He has been awarded the Smoluchowski-Warburg Medal of German and Polish Physics Societies, a Senior Carl von Linde Fellowship at TUM-IAS and an Advanced ERC Grant. He is an ordinary member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and foreign member of two Academies in Poland.