First Search for CP Violation in Tau Lepton Decay

Authors

S. Anderson, University of Minnesota - Minneapolis
Kenneth A. Bloom, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
CLEO Collaboration

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

11-2-1998

Comments

Published by American Physical Society. Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 3823 (1998). http://prl.aps.org. Copyright © 1998 American Physical Society. Permission to use.

Abstract

We have performed the first search for CP violation in tau lepton decay. CP violation in lepton decay does not occur in the minimal standard model but can occur in extensions such as the multi- Higgs doublet model. It appears as a characteristic difference between the τ^- and τ⁺ decay angular distributions for the semileptonic decay modes such as τ^- → K⁰ π^-ν. We define an observable asymmetry to exploit this and find no evidence for any CP violation.