B -> D* l nu and B -> D l nu form factors in staggered chiral perturbation theory

We calculate the B -> D and B -> D* form factors at zero recoil in Staggered Chiral Perturbation Theory. We consider heavy-light mesons in which only the light (u, d, or s) quark is staggered; current lattice simulations generally use a highly improved action such as the Fermilab or NRQCD action for the heavy (b or c) quark. We work to lowest nontrivial order in the heavy quark expansion and to one-loop in the chiral expansion. We present results for a partially quenched theory with three sea quarks in which there are no mass degeneracies (the "1+1+1" theory) and for a partially quenched theory in which the u and d sea quark masses are equal (the "2+1" theory). We also present results for full (2+1) QCD, along with a numerical estimate of the size of staggered discretization errors. Finally, we calculate the finite volume corrections to the form factors and estimate their numerical size in current lattice simulations.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figures, references added, expanded discussion in Section I

B_K in Staggered Chiral Perturbation Theory

We calculate the kaon B-parameter, B_K, to next-to-leading order in staggered chiral perturbation theory. We find expressions for partially quenched QCD with three sea quarks, quenched QCD, and full QCD with m_u = m_d but not equal to m_s. We extend the usual power counting to include the effects of using perturbative (rather than non-perturbative) matching factors. Taste breaking enters through the O(a^2) terms in the effective action, through O(a^2) terms from the discretization of operators, and through the truncation of matching factors. These effects cause mixing with several additional operators, complicating the chiral and continuum extrapolations. In addition to the staggered expressions, we present B_K at next-to-leading order in continuum partially quenched chiral perturbation theory for N_f=3 sea quarks with m_u = m_d but not equal to m_s.Comment: 56 pages, 3 figures (v3: Corrected normalization error in Eq.(4) and subsequent equations; physics results unchanged. Version accepted to Phys. Rev. D.