# An Investigation of the Soft Pion Relation in Quenched Lattice QCD

## 1 Introduction

Heavy-quark and chiral symmetries combine to predict the following relation for a heavy-light meson H the mass of whose heavy quark is larger than some arbitrary hadronic scale, and for a soft pion:

$$f_0(q_{\mathrm{max}}^2)_{H\pi }=f_H/f_\pi $$
(1)   
where $`f_0(q^2)`$ is the form factor in the $`0^+`$ channel for the vector current hadronic matrix element $`H(p)|V^\mu |\pi (pq)`$. The two quantities on the right-hand side are the corresponding PS meson decay constants. Equation 1 is the soft pion relation for heavy-light PS mesons .

Results are given for $`f_0(q_{\mathrm{max}}^2)_{H\pi }`$ and $`f_H/f_\pi `$ for heavy-light PS mesons and are extrapolated to the B mass. Errors are quoted as

$$f_B=190(5)_{\mathrm{stat}.}(10)_{\mathrm{sys}.}\mathrm{MeV}.$$
(2)   
## 2 Extracting the form factors

The form factors for the hadronic matrix element of semileptonic heavy pseudoscalar decay to a pion are extracted from mass extrapolations of the appropriate matrix elements of quenched lattice QCD with SW action  with $`a^1`$=2.6(1) GeV, $`\beta `$=6.2 on a $`24^3\times 48`$ lattice using 216 gauge configurations generated with a combination of the Cabbibo-Marinari algorithm  and an over-relaxed algorithm . The matrix elements are calculated using the method of extended quark propagators with all combinations of the following hopping parameters:

$`\kappa _{\mathrm{heavy}}`$ $``$ $`\{0.1200,0.1233,0.1266,0.1299\}`$   
$`\kappa _{\mathrm{light}}`$ $``$ $`\{0.1346,0.1351,0.1353\}`$   
$`\kappa _{\mathrm{spectator}}`$ $``$ $`\{0.1346,0.1351\}.`$   
From the light PS meson masses $`\kappa _{\mathrm{crit}}`$=0.13582(1)(2) is found.

The action and operators are improved to O($`a`$) and renormalized to a continuum scheme, using coefficients determined non-perturbatively where possible . The following values are used:    $`Z_V`$ = 0.792 $`Z_A`$ = 0.807  $`b_V`$ = 1.41 $`b_A`$ = 1.11  $`c_V`$ = $`1.58\times 10^2`$ $`c_A`$ = $`3.71\times 10^2`$  $`c_{SW}`$ = 1.61 $`b_M`$ = 0.583   Of these, only $`c_V`$, $`b_A`$ and $`b_M`$ are determined from a perturbative scheme .

In the continuum, the form factors $`f_+`$ and $`f_0`$ are defined from hadronic matrix elements as follows:   
$`H(p)|V^\mu |\pi (pq)=`$   
$`f_+(q^2)\left(2p^\mu \left[\left(M_H^2M_\pi ^2\right)/q^2+1\right]q^\mu \right)`$\+   
$`f_0(q^2)\left(\left[M_H^2M_\pi ^2\right]/q^2\right)q^\mu `$

## 3 Pion physics on the lattice

Lattice correlators in this study are directly relevant to the physics of heavy-light mesons with mass $`13002200`$ MeV, and of light-light mesons with mass $`350850`$ MeV. Form factors at the same value of $`q^2`$ for decays to a pion can be estimated by assuming the following dependence of a form factor $`f\{f_+,f_0\}`$ on the meson masses:

$$f(q^2,M,m)=f(q^2,M_{\mathrm{chiral}},0)+a\times \mathrm{\Delta }M+b\times m^2$$
(3)   
and fitting the data to determine $`f(0)`$ and $`a`$. Similarly light-light meson and heavy-light meson decay contants $`f_L`$ and $`f_H`$ are extrapolated in the meson mass according to the following:

$$f_L(m)=f_L(0)+a^{}\times m^2$$
(4)   
$$f_H(M)=f_H(M_{\mathrm{chiral}})+a^{\prime \prime }\times \mathrm{\Delta }M$$
(5)   
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }MMM_{\mathrm{chiral}}`$.

The $`q^2`$ dependence of the form factors can be modelled using the following parameterization .

$`f_+(q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_B(1\alpha )}{(1q^2/M_{}^2)(1\alpha q^2/M_{}^2)}}`$ (6)   
$`f_0(q^2)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_B(1\alpha )}{(1q^2/\beta M_{}^2)}}`$ (7)   
where $`M_{}`$ is the heavy-light vector meson mass. $`f_0(q_{\mathrm{max}}^2)`$ is extracted by extrapolating $`f_0`$ upwards in $`q^2`$ using the best fit curve from a fit of 7 (fig. 1). One finds the soft pion relation to be well satisfied at simulated values of heavy quark mass.

## 4 The soft pion relation for $`B\pi `$

Heavy quark effective theory predicts the following form for the dependence of $`f_0`$ on the heavy quark mass, at constant recoil variable $`v(pq)`$:

$$f_0(M,\omega )\mathrm{\Theta }(M)\sqrt{M}=a+b/M+c/M^2+O(\frac{1}{M^3})$$
(8)   
and for a heavy-light pseudoscalar decay constant:

$$f_H(M)\mathrm{\Theta }(M)\sqrt{M}=a^{}+b^{}/M+c^{}/M^2+O(\frac{1}{M^3})$$
(9)   
where $`\mathrm{\Theta }(M)`$ is a perturbative matching coefficient function whose value is very close to 1. These prescriptions are used as fit ansatz to determine a best fit quadratic in 1/M to the data in table 1. The curve is shown in (fig. 2). Values for $`f_0(q_{\mathrm{max}}^2)`$ and $`f_H`$ extrapolated to the b mass are presented in table 2.

It is instructive to repeat the whole procedure, extrapolating form factors for a pion which is not massless but has its physical mass. Results are presented in table 3 and are practically unchanged from the massless case.

## 5 Systematic error

Systematic error in this work arises from:

1. discretization errors of O($`a^2`$)
2. quenched approximation
3. estimation of correlation matrix for fits
4. interpolation of lattice form factors in $`q^2`$
5. corrections to heavy quark effective theory
6. choice in setting the scale.

The quoted systematic error is an estimate of the variation arising from the last sources $`36`$, achieved by repeating the analysis with different numbers of bootstrap sets, varying the model function used to interpolate the form factor in $`q^2`$, changing the degree of the polynomial in 1/M used as an ansatz for the extrapolation in heavy mass, and setting the scale alternatively against $`M_\rho `$ and the gluonic scale $`r_0`$. Quenching error is not quantified here. Residual discretization errors also may be significant, particularly in the heavy extrapolation where the fitted curve used may be diverted substantially by a correction to the lattice form factor at the largest simulated heavy quark mass, for which $`(Ma)^20.65`$.

## 6 Conclusions

For a simulated heavy-light decay whose mass is within 20% of $`M_D`$, the soft pion relation is reproduced in this study. On extrapolating the form factor and the heavy-light decay constant to the B mass, systematic errors become O(30%), to within which precision the soft pion relation holds for B meson decays. Other approaches to date  have generally violated this relation, with the form factor lying significantly below the ratio of decay constants. Work is ongoing with the prospect of controlling further the systematic error, and a simulation at $`\beta =6.0`$ including a static heavy quark will address a large source of systematic uncertainty as well as providing scaling information .