14 - Standard Model Effective Field Theory

Summary

Chapter 14 will be rather general, and it will be strategically useful to look next at specific simple examples of NP. Having already all relevant SM formulas for flavor observables at hand, it will be of interest to see how they generalize beyond the SM. In this step we will first discuss the concept of minimal flavor violation (MFV), that is the most modest modification of the flavor-violating effects found in the SM. In these models a number of strict correlations between flavor observablesare found. Next we will go go beyond MFV models considering the so-called simplified models in which NP contributions to flavor-violating processes are dominated by tree-level exchanges of neutral bosons, in particular the SM Z-boson, a heavy neutral gauge boson Z', and a heavy scalaror pseudoscalar. In these models FCNC processes appear already at tree-level modifying in a striking manner the pattern of flavor violation found in the SM and in MFV models. Moreover, right-handed currents will enter the scene. We will see that some of thesesimplified models will give us some insight into the origin of anomalies found in previous chapters.