The generating functional for hadronic weak interactions and its quenched approximation

Abstract

We derive the generating functional of $|\Delta S| =1, 2$ hadronic weak interactions at one loop for a generic number of flavours and its counterpart in the quenched approximation. A systematic analysis of the ultraviolet divergences in the full theory (with and without a singlet dynamical field) and in the quenched case is performed. We show that the quenched chiral logarithms in the presence of weak interactions amount to a redefinition of the weak mass term in the $\Delta S=\pm 1$ weak effective Lagrangian at leading order. Finally, we apply the results to $B_K$ and $K\to\pi\pi$ matrix elements with $\Delta I=1/2,3/2$ to analyze the modifications induced by quenching on the coefficients of chiral logarithms in the one-loop corrections.