Inclusive semileptonic decays of heavy hadrons from first principles

by Alessandro De Santis (Uni. Mainz)

Monday 19 Jan 2026, 16:00 → 17:00 Europe/Berlin

D308 (ENC)

Inclusive semileptonic decays of heavy hadrons, $H \mapsto X \ell \bar \nu$, are phenomenologically important to test the Standard Model and to address open issues such as the long-standing discrepancy between inclusive and exclusive determinations of the CKM matrix element $|V_{cb}|$. Their computation from first principles is challenging from both the numerical and theoretical points of view. Since non-perturbative hadronic interactions are involved, one has to rely on lattice QCD simulations. On the other hand, the decay rate is related to a smeared hadronic spectral density, which can be extracted using spectral reconstruction methods. In this talk, I provide an introductory overview of the main concepts, challenges, methods, and recent achievements in this field, with a particular focus on the process $D_s\mapsto X \ell \bar\nu$  and on the ongoing effort to compute the decay rate of $B_s\mapsto X \ell \bar \nu$.