The course begins with an introduction to the Standard Model, viewed as an effective field theory. Experimental and theoretical limits on the energy scales at which New Physics can appear, as well as current constraints on quark flavor parameters, ar
e reviewed. The role of lattice QCD in obtaining these constraints is described. A second section is devoted to explaining the Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa mechanism for quark flavor mixing and CP violation, and to detailing its most salient features. The third section is dedicated to the study of K -> pi pi decays. It comprises discussions of indirect CP violation through K^0-bar K^0 mixing, of the Delta I=1/2 rule and of direct CP violation. It presents some of the lattice QCD tools required to describe these phenomena ab initio.
I critically review recent lattice QCD results relevant for kaon phenomenology, as well as the methods that are used to obtain them. The focus is on calculations with N_f=2 and N_f=2+1 flavors of sea quarks. Concerning methodology, the subjects cover
ed include a discussion of how best to extrapolate and/or interpolate results to the physical quark-mass point, a scheme for assessing the extent to which a lattice QCD calculation includes the various effects required to compute a given quantity reliably and a procedure for averaging lattice results. The phenomenological topics that I review comprise leptonic and semileptonic kaon decays, as well as neutral kaon mixing and CP violation in K->pipi decays.
