Bilas Pal (U. Cincinnati)

Precision measurement of Λb baryon lifetime using 3.0 fb-1 of LHCb data

Lifetimes of heavy hadrons are an important basis for understanding the efficacy of the theoretical models of heavy quark decay. One of the unsolved mystery of the b hadron lifetime measurements was the Λb baryon lifetime. An early prediction from the Heavy Quark Expansion (HQE) theory was that the Λb  lifetime was almost equal to that of the B0 meson, but shorter by 1-2%. In the past, experimental results have been in disagreement with the theoretical expectations. In 2003 one widely quoted average of all data gave 0.798 ± 0.052. This situation  has recently been clarified by a precise LHCb measurement using 1.0 fb-1 of  data and lends substantial support to the HQE theory. I will be talking about the precision measurement of Λb baryon lifetime using 3.0 fb-1 of LHCb data.

Dec 3 at 2.30pm in Geo/Phys Room 407