Flavour anomalies on the eve of the Run-2 verdict

Abstract

The RK measurement by LHCb suggests non-standard lepton-universality violation (LUV) to occur in b to s l+ l- decays, with effects in muons rather than electrons. It is intriguing that a number of other measurements of b to s l+ l- transitions by LHCb and B-factories are consistent in magnitude and sign with the RK effect, and fit a coherent effective-theory picture. Further indications of non-standard LUV are provided by the long-standing discrepancies in b to c tau nu transitions via the ratios R(D) and R(D^*). We review in detail the experimental situation and its rich outlook, the theoretical efforts -- and their challenges -- towards convincing dynamics beyond the effective-theory level, and discuss the many directions of further investigation that propagate from the current situation.

Comments: 14 pages. Preprint of invited short review for MPLA (World Scientific). Matches journal version. See http://www.worldscientific.com/worldscinet/mpla