$\boldsymbol{μ^-}$- $\boldsymbol{e^+}$ Conversion from Short-Range Operators

Abstract: We present a detailed discussion of the lepton flavour and number violating conversion of bound muons into positrons. This process is a viable alternative to neutrinoless double beta decay and, given that experiments on ordinary $\mu^-$- $e^-$ conversion are expected to improve their sensitivities by several orders of magnitude in the coming years, we can also assume the limit on $\mu^-$- $e^+$ conversion to improve by roughly the same factor. We discuss how new physics at a high scale can lead to short-range contributions to this conversion process and we present one explicit case in great detail (the single one for which the corresponding nuclear matrix element is presently known). The main goal of our discussion is to make the respective computation accessible to the particle physics community, so that promising models can be investigated while the nuclear physics community can simultaneously advance the computation of nuclear matrix elements. Given the progress to be expected on the experimental side, it may even be possible that lepton number violation in the $e\mu$-sector is discovered by $\mu^-$- $e^+$ conversion before neutrinoless double beta decay can show its existence in the $ee$-sector.