New physics in $s\to d$ semileptonic transitions: rare hyperon vs. kaon decays

TL;DR

This paper explores how rare hyperon decays can serve as sensitive probes for new physics in $s o d$ transitions, offering complementary insights to kaon decay measurements and emphasizing the importance of loop effects in effective field theories.

Contribution

It demonstrates the potential of hyperon decay measurements to constrain new physics operators more effectively than current kaon decay bounds, highlighting the role of angular observables and renormalization effects.

Findings

Hyperon decay rates are sensitive to short-distance operators.

BESIII measurements could improve constraints on axial vector currents.

Kaon bounds generally outperform hyperon decay constraints, except in specific new physics scenarios.

Abstract

We investigate the potential of rare hyperon decays to probe the short distance structure in the $s\to d\nu\bar\nu$ and $s\to d\ell^+\ell^-$ transitions. Hyperon decays into neutrinos ($B_1\to B_2\nu\bar\nu$) can be reliably predicted by using form factors determined in baryon chiral perturbation theory. Their decay rates are sensitive to different short-distance operators, as compared to their kaon counterparts, and the corresponding branching fractions are in the range of $10^{-14}\sim10^{-13}$ in the standard model. In the context of the low-energy effective theory, we find that the anticipated BESIII measurements of the $B_1\to B_2\nu\bar\nu$ decays would lead to constraints on new physics in the purely axial vector $\bar d \gamma_\mu\gamma_5 s$ current that are stronger than the present limits from their kaon siblings $K\to \pi\pi\nu\bar\nu$. On the other hand, although hyperon decays into charged leptons are dominated by long-distance hadronic contributions, angular observable such as the leptonic forward-backward asymmetry is sensitive to the interference between long- and short-distance contributions. We discuss the sensitivity to new physics of a potential measurement of this observable in comparison with observables in the kaon decays $K_L\to\mu^+\mu^-$ and $K^+\to\pi^+\mu^+\mu^-$. We conclude that the current kaon bounds are a few orders of magnitude better than those that could be obtained from $\Sigma^+\to p\mu^+\mu^-$ except for two scenarios with new physics in the $(\bar d \gamma^\mu s)(\bar\ell\gamma_\mu\gamma_5\ell)$ and $(\bar d \gamma^\mu \gamma_5s)(\bar\ell\gamma_\mu\ell)$ currents. Finally, we point out that the loop effects from renormalization group evolution are important in this context, when relating the low-energy effective field theory to new physics models in the UV.