Higgs--mediated K -> pi nu nu-bar in the MSSM at large tan(beta)

We analyze the impact of Higgs-mediated amplitudes on the rare decays KL -> pi0 nu nu-bar and K+ -> pi+ nu nu-bar in the MSSM with large tan(beta) and general flavour mixing. We point out that, going beyond the minimal flavour violation hypothesis, Z-penguin amplitudes generated by charged-Higgs exchange can induce sizable modifications of K -> pi nu nu-bar rates. Interestingly, these effects scale as tan^4(beta) at the amplitude level. For large values of tan(beta), this mechanism allows deviations from the SM expectations even for tiny (CKM-type) off-diagonal mixing terms in the right-handed squark sector.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figure

Radiative Non-Leptonic Kaon Decays

We investigate to what extent DA$\Phi$NE will be able to test the Standard Model in the confinement regime with radiative kaon decays. We concentrate on processes which can be detected at DA$\Phi$NE and we review briefly those decays where only upper limits can be expected. The Standard Model predictions for these decays are analyzed in the framework of chiral perturbation theory.Comment: 41 pages, latex file, 10 figures added in a separate uufil

Electromagnetism in nonleptonic weak interactions

We construct a low-energy effective field theory that permits the complete treatment of isospin-breaking effects in nonleptonic weak interactions to next-to-leading order. To this end, we enlarge the chiral Lagrangian describing strong and Delta S=1 weak interactions by including electromagnetic terms with the photon as additional dynamical degree of freedom. The complete and minimal list of local terms at next-to-leading order is given. We perform the one-loop renormalization at the level of the generating functional and specialize to K -> pi pi decays.Comment: 17 pages, 1 figure; 2 references added, final version for publication in Nucl. Phys.

The rare decay B --> X_s l^+ l^- to NNLL precision for arbitrary dilepton invariant mass

We present a new phenomenological analysis of the inclusive rare decay $B \to X_s \ell^+\ell^-$. In particular, we present the first calculation of the NNLL contributions due to the leading two-loop matrix elements, evaluated for arbitrary dilepton invariant mass. This allows to obtain the first NNLL estimates of the dilepton mass spectrum and the lepton forward-backward asymmetry in the high $M^2_{\ell^+ \ell^-}$ region, and to provide an independent check of previously published results in the low $M^2_{\ell^+ \ell^-}$ region. The numerical impact of these NNLL corrections in the high-mass region ($M^2_{\ell^+ \ell^-} > 14.4 GeV^2$) amounts to -13% in the integrated rate, and leads to a reduction of the scale uncertainty to $\pm 3$. The impact of non-perturbative contributions in this region is also discussed in detail.Comment: 40 pages, 12 figures. v2: extended phenomenological discussion; results unchanged; published versio

Direct CP violation in K->3pi decays induced by SUSY chromomagnetic penguins

An analysis of the CP violating asymmetry in $K^\pm \to (3\pi)^\pm$ decays in the Standard Model and, by means of the mass insertion approximation, in a wide class of possible supersymmetric extensions, is presented. We find that the natural order of magnitude for this asymmetry is \cO(10^{-5}) in both cases. Within supersymmetric models effects as large as \cO(10^{-4}) are possible, but only in a restricted range of the relevant parameters.Comment: Latex, 11 pages, 1 figur