Semileptonic B Meson Decays and Interfering Amplitudes

Abstract

Consequences of the interference between external and internal spectator amplitudes for the lifetimes and semileptonic decay fractions of $B^0$ and $B^+$ mesons are discussed. Extrapolating from the constructive interference observed in 11 exclusive hadronic $B$ decays we find an inclusive semileptonic decay fraction of $(11.2 \pm 0.5 \pm 1.7)$\%, significantly closer to the experimental results than previous predictions.