Charming penguins and lepton universality violation in $$\varvec{b \rightarrow s \ell ^+ \ell ^-}$$ decays
Marco Ciuchini (INFN Sezione di Roma Tre, Via della Vasca Navale 84, Rome, 00146, Italy); Marco Fedele (Institut für Theoretische Teilchenphysik, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Karlsruhe, 76131, Germany); Enrico Franco (INFN Sezione di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 2, Rome, 00185, Italy); Ayan Paul (Institut für Physik, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, 12489, Germany, Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY, Notkestr. 85, Hamburg, 22607, Germany); Luca Silvestrini (INFN Sezione di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 2, Rome, 00185, Italy); et al - Show all 6 authors
The LHCb experiment has recently presented new results on Lepton Universality Violation (LUV) in $$B \rightarrow K^{(*)} \ell ^+ \ell ^-$$ decays involving $$K_S$$ in the final state, which strengthen the recent evidence of LUV obtained in $$B^+ \rightarrow K^{+} \ell ^+ \ell ^-$$ decays and the previous measurements of $$B \rightarrow K^{*0} \ell ^+ \ell ^-$$ . While LUV observables in the Standard Model are theoretically clean, their predictions in New Physics scenarios are sensitive to the details of the hadronic dynamics, and in particular of the charming penguin contribution. In this work, we show how a conservative treatment of hadronic uncertainties is crucial not only to assess the significance of deviations from the Standard Model but also to obtain a conservative picture of the New Physics responsible for LUV. Adopting a very general parameterization of charming penguins, we find that: (i) current data hint at a sizable $$q^2$$ and helicity dependence of charm loop amplitudes; (ii) conservative NP solutions to B anomalies favour a left-handed or an axial lepton coupling rather than a vector one.