Measurement of the $tau$ lepton polarization in the decay ${bar B} rightarrow D^* tau^- {bar u_{tau}}$

We report the first measurement of the $tau$ lepton polarization in the decay ${bar B} rightarrow D^* tau^- {bar u_{tau}}$ as well as a new measurement of the ratio of the branching fractions $R(D^{*}) = mathcal{B}({bar B} rightarrow D^* tau^- {bar u_{tau}}) / mathcal{B}({bar B} rightarrow D^* ell^- {bar u_{ell}})$, where $ell^-$ denotes an electron or a muon, with the decays $tau^- rightarrow pi^- u_{tau}$ and $tau^- rightarrow rho^- u_{tau}$. We use the full data sample of $772 times 10^6$ $B{bar B}$ pairs accumulated with the Belle detector at the KEKB electron-positron collider. Our preliminary results, $R(D^*) = 0.276 pm 0.034{rm (stat.)} ^{+0.029} _{-0.026}{rm (syst.)}$ and $P_{tau} = -0.44 pm 0.47 {rm (stat.)} ^{+0.20} _{-0.17} {rm (syst.)}$, are consistent with the theoretical predictions of the Standard Model within $0.6$ standard deviation.