Application of chiral perturbation theory to K→2π decays

Abstract

Chiral perturbation theory is applied to the decay K→2π. It is shown that, to quadratic order in meson masses, the amplitude for K→2π can be written in terms of the unphysical amplitudes K→π and K→0, where 0 is the vacuum. One may then hope to calculate these two simpler amplitudes with lattice Monte Carlo techniques, and thereby gain understanding of the ΔI=1/2 rule in K decay. The reason for the presence of the K→0 amplitude is explained: it serves to cancel off unwanted renormalization contributions to K→π. We make a rough test of the practicability of these ideas in Monte Carlo studies. We also describe a method for evaluating meson decay constants which does not require a determination of the quark masses.

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