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Observational Constraints on Local Lorentz Invariance

The idea that local Lorentz invariance might be violated due to new physics that goes beyond the Standard Model of particle physics and Einstein's General Relativity has received a great deal of interest in recent years. At the same time, new experiments have been designed and conducted that are able to test Lorentz symmetry at unprecedented levels. Much of this theoretical and experimental progress has been driven by the development of the framework for investigating Lorentz violation known as the Standard Model Extension (SME). The SME is the lagrangian-based effective field theory that by definition contains all Lorentz-violating interaction terms that can be written as observer scalars involving particle fields in the Standard Model and gravitational fields in a generalized theory of gravity. This includes all terms that could arise from a process of spontaneous Lorentz violation as well as terms that explicitly break Lorentz symmetry. In this article, an overview of the SME is presented, including its motivations and construction. A very useful minimal version of the SME in Minkowski spacetime that maintains gauge invariance and power-counting renormalizability is constructed as well. Data tables summarizing tests of local Lorentz invariance for the different particle sectors in the Standard Model and with gravity are maintained by Kostelecký's group at Indiana University. A partial survey of these tests, including some of the high-precision sensitivities they attain, is presented here.