Electroweak gauge boson

In the $(A^1,A^2,A^3,B)$ basis with gauge transformations $U=e^{i\alpha Q}$ and $Q=T_3+Y$, the non-Abelian connection transforms by conjugation. The Lie brackets $[T_3,T_1]=i{T}_2$ and $[T_3,T_2]=-i{T}_1$ give $\delta A^1=\alpha A^2$, $\delta A^2=-\alpha A^1$, with neutral $A^3,B$. Thus $\delta A=i\alpha Q_{\mathrm{gauge}}A$ gives the displayed Hermitian matrix. The fields $W^{\pm }=(A^1\mp i{A}^2)/\sqrt{2}$ transform as $e^{\pm i\alpha }{W}^{\pm }$, while both neutral combinations are uncharged. This separates the Adjoint representation on the gauge fields from the doublet charge matrix $\mathrm{diag}(1,0)$ on the Higgs field.

The charged electroweak gauge fields are $W_{\mu }^{\pm }=(W_{\mu }^1\mp i{W}_{\mu }^2)/\sqrt{2}$. After electroweak symmetry breaking they have electric charges $\pm 1$ and mass $gv/2$.

Neglect final-state masses and QCD corrections. Each of the three leptonic W boson decay channels contributes one common unit of width. Each open quark channel contributes $3|V_{ij}{|}^2$, with the factor three counting final colours. The top quark is kinematically inaccessible in an on-shell W decay because $m_t>m_W$. Thus $B(W\to \ell \nu )=1/D\simeq 1/9$ and $B(W^{-}\to b\bar{u},b\bar{c})=3(|V_{ub}{|}^2+|V_{cb}{|}^2)/D$. The large $V_{tb}$ does not open a forbidden top-quark channel.

In unitary gauge, the free massive W boson has the displayed momentum-space propagator. At external momentum small compared with $M_W$, its leading term is $i{g}_{\mu \nu }/M_W^2$. Inserting it between two weak charged current vertices produces the local Fermi interaction, with $G_F/\sqrt{2}=g^2/(8M_W^2)$ when each vertex is written with $1-{\gamma }_5$. Higher momentum terms give higher-dimensional operators; other gauges distribute the longitudinal contribution differently while giving the same physical amplitudes.

With three massless lepton families, two accessible up-type quarks, three colors, and no Quantum chromodynamics radiative correction, a W boson has total decay width $9{\Gamma }_{\ell }$. With an identity CKM matrix, each leptonic channel has branching fraction $1/9$ and each of the two allowed quark-flavour channels has $1/3$. With mixing, each accessible quark channel is weighted by $|V_{ij}{|}^2$, while row unitarity preserves the total at this order if all down-type channels are accessible.

The chiral weak charged current vertex $-ig{\gamma }^{\mu }(1-{\gamma }_5)/(2\sqrt{2})$ gives the spin-averaged squared matrix element $g^2{M}_W^2/3$ for an on-shell W boson decaying to a massless charged lepton and antineutrino. Integrating two-body Lorentz-invariant phase space gives ${\Gamma }_{\ell }=g^2{M}_W/(48\pi )$. The massive-vector spin average divides by three; an extra neutrino-helicity factor would incorrectly double count the chiral projector.

For a resting W boson with real spatial polarization vector along $z$, the fermion spin sum gives $\sum |\mathcal{M}{|}^2=g^2{M}_W^2{\sin }^2\theta /2$ for massless charged lepton and antineutrino momenta. The two-body Lorentz-invariant phase space gives the displayed angular decay rate. Since $\int {\sin }^2\theta d\Omega =8\pi /3$, the integrated width is $g^2{M}_W/(48\pi )$, equal to the unpolarized width. The massive-vector spin average changes the angular distribution, not the total width. No initial spin average is taken for a specified pure polarization.

For an on-shell W with zero transverse recoil and massless leptons, $p_T=(M_W/2)\sin \theta$. Mapping both angular roots to one transverse momentum produces an integrable inverse-square-root edge. For a normalized polar distribution $3(1-\cos \theta {)}^2/8$, the density in $x=2p_T/M_W$ is $3x(2-x^2)/(4\sqrt{1-x^2})$. Finite width, transverse recoil and detector resolution smear the edge.

Ignoring accessible quark masses and strong corrections, the W boson flavor width is $\Gamma (W^{+}\to q{\bar{q}}^{\prime })=N_c{G}_F{M}_W^3|V_{q{q}^{\prime }}{|}^2/(6\pi \sqrt{2})$. The CKM matrix fixes the flavor factor, while the color multiplicity in a decay width supplies $N_c=3$. Only the up and charm rows are accessible for an on-shell W boson, giving a total hadronic width $G_F{M}_W^3/(\pi \sqrt{2})$ by row unitarity.

The neutral massive electroweak gauge field is proportional to $g{W}_{\mu }^3-g^{\prime }{B}_{\mu }$ and has mass $v\sqrt{g^2+g^{\prime 2}}/2$.

For equally coupled light active neutrinos, the total invisible width is the sum of the single-species widths. A three-flavor invisible width near $501$ MeV corresponds to about $167$ MeV per species. It must not be assigned to each additional neutrino separately.

For a pure resonant Z boson with negligible fermion masses, ${\mathcal{A}}_f=(|g_L^f{|}^2-|g_R^f{|}^2)/(|g_L^f{|}^2+|g_R^f{|}^2)$ and $A_{FB}=3{\mathcal{A}}_e{\mathcal{A}}_f/4$. Lepton universality makes this $3{\mathcal{A}}_{\ell }^2/4$ for charged leptons. A nonzero value diagnoses parity violation within this single-resonance approximation; a general angular forward-backward asymmetry need not be parity odd.

At leading order, for final fermions much lighter than the Z boson, the partial decay width is proportional to $N_c(|g_L{|}^2+|g_R{|}^2)$. Here $N_c$ is the final-state color multiplicity in a decay width, and $g_L=T_{3L}-Q{\sin }^2{\theta }_W$, $g_R=T_{3R}-Q{\sin }^2{\theta }_W$ are the dimensionless left- and right-chirality couplings. The common normalization cancels in ratios.

For an electron, $g_L=-1/2+{\sin }^2{\theta }_W$, $g_R={\sin }^2{\theta }_W$. For one active neutrino flavour, $g_L=1/2$, $g_R=0$. ThereforeThere is no extra flavour factor for a single specified neutrino species. Summing the three active species produces three times that invisible partial width, within the same massless approximation.

For a vertex $(g/c_W){\gamma }^{\mu }(c_V-c_A{\gamma }^5)$ into one massless color-singlet particle-antiparticle pair, the massive-vector spin average and two-body Lorentz-invariant phase space give $\Gamma =g^2{m}_Z(c_V^2+c_A^2)/(12\pi c_W^2)$. With Standard Model neutral-current vector and axial couplings, one neutrino flavor has ${\Gamma }_{\nu }=g^2{m}_Z/(96\pi c_W^2)$ and one charged-lepton flavor has ${\Gamma }_{\ell }={\Gamma }_{\nu }(1-4s_W^2+8s_W^4)$. Chiral projectors already remove inactive neutrino helicities. These are tree-level massless results.

Each effectively massless active neutrino species contributes the same invisible Z boson partial decay width. Subtracting calculated or measured visible widths from the total width therefore measures the displayed number, assuming no additional invisible channels. The inference concerns particles lighter than $M_Z/2$ with ordinary weak couplings. It does not exclude heavier neutrinos or right-handed neutrinos that are gauge singlets. Early LEP resonance measurements were consistent with three light active species, with statistical uncertainty. See the OPAL report on its 1989 data for the original resonance-width comparison.

For the Z boson vertex $g{\gamma }^{\mu }(c_v-c_a{\gamma }^5)/(2c_W)$, sum over the three initial polarizations and final fermion spins. The symmetric Dirac trace is $4(c_v^2+c_a^2)(k_1^{\mu }{k}_2^{\nu }+k_1^{\nu }{k}_2^{\mu }-g^{\mu \nu }{k}_1\cdot k_2)$. The vector-axial interference is antisymmetric and drops out of the massive vector polarization sum. The longitudinal term drops out by current conservation for massless final particles. Contracting the remaining trace gives the displayed result. The massive-vector spin average divides it by three; two-body Lorentz-invariant phase space then gives $\Gamma =g^2{M}_Z(c_v^2+c_a^2)/(48\pi c_W^2)$ per color. These coefficients are twice those used with a vertex prefactor $g/c_W$.