Improved Limits on Lepton-Flavor-Violating τ Decays to ℓϕ, ℓρ, ℓK∗, and ℓ¯¯¯¯K∗

Abstract

We search for the neutrinoless, lepton-flavor-violating tau decays τ − → ℓ − V 0 , where ℓ is an electron or muon and V 0 is a vector meson reconstructed as ϕ → K + K − , ρ → π + π − , K ∗ → K + π − , ¯¯¯¯ K ∗ → K − π + . The analysis has been performed using 451 fb − 1 of data collected at an e + e − center-of-mass energy near 10.58 GeV with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II storage rings. The number of events found in the data is compatible with the background expectation, and upper limits on the branching fractions are set in the range ( 2.6 - 19 ) × 10 − 8 at the 90% confidence level.