Single top polarisation as a window to new physics

We discuss the effect of heavy new physics, parameterised in terms of four-fermion operators, in the polarisation of single top (anti-)quarks in the t-channel process at the LHC. It is found that for operators involving a right-handed top quark field the relative effect on the longitudinal polarisation is twice larger than the relative effect on the total cross section. This enhanced dependence on possible four-fermion contributions makes the polarisation measurements specially interesting, in particular at high momenta. (C) 2017 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license.