B Meson Decays

Marina Artuso, Elisabetta Barberio, Sheldon Stone

Published 2009-02-21, updated 2009-12-03Version 4

We discuss the most important Physics thus far extracted from studies of B meson decays. Measurements of the four CP violating angles accessible in B decay are reviewed as well as direct CP violation. A detailed discussion of the measurements of the CKM elements V_{cb} and V_{ub} from semileptonic decays is given, and the differences between resulting values using inclusive decays versus exclusive decays is discussed. Measurements of "rare" decays are also reviewed. We point out where CP violating and rare decays could lead to observations of physics beyond that of the Standard Model in future experiments. If such physics is found by directly observation of new particles, e.g. in LHC experiments, B decays can play a decisive role in interpreting the nature of these particles.