Transverse Tau Polarization in Decays of the Top and Bottom Quarks in the Weinberg Model of CP Non-conservation

Abstract

We show that the transverse polarization asymmetry of the $\tau$-lepton in the decay $t\rightarrow b \tau \nu$ is extremely sensitive to CP violating phases arising from the charged Higgs exchange in the Weinberg model of CP non-conservation. Qualitatively, the polarization asymmetries are enhanced over rate or energy asymmetries by a factor of $\approx {m_t\over m_\tau}\approx O(100)$. Thus for optimal values of the parameters the method requires $\approx 10^4$ top pairs to be observable rather than $10^7$ needed for rate or energy asymmetries. We also examine $\tau$ polarization in b decays via $b \rightarrow c \nu \tau$ and find that it can also be very effective in constraining the CP violation parameters of the extended Higgs sector.