Mixing-induced CP Asymmetries in Radiative B Decays in and beyond the Standard Model

In the Standard Model (SM) the photon in radiative $\bar B^0$ and $\bar B_s$ decays is predominantly left-handed. Thus, mixing induced CP asymmetries in $b\to s\gamma$ and $b\to d\gamma$ are suppressed by $m_s/m_b$ and $m_d/m_b$, respectively, and are very small. In many extensions of the SM, such as the left-right symmetric model (LRSM), SU(2)xU(1) models with exotic fermions and SUSY, the amplitude of right-handed photons grows proportional to the virtual heavy fermion mass, which can lead to large asymmetries. As an example, in the LRSM, asymmetries larger than 50% are possible even when radiative decay rate measurements agree with SM predictions.