Observation of $C\!P$ violation in charm decays

A search for charge-parity ($C\!P$) violation in $D^0 \to K^- K^+$ and $D^0 \to π^- π^+$ decays is reported, using $pp$ collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 6 $\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ collected at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV with the LHCb detector. The flavor of the charm meson is inferred from the charge of the pion in $D^*(2010)^+ \to D^0 π^+$ decays or from the charge of the muon in $\overline{B} \to D^0 μ^-\barν_μX$ decays. The difference between the $C\!P$ asymmetries in $D^0 \to K^- K^+$ and $D^0 \to π^- π^+$ decays is measured to be $ΔA_{C\!P} = [ -18.2 \pm 3.2\,(\rm stat.) \pm 0.9\,(\rm syst.) ] \times 10^{-4}$ for $π$-tagged and $ΔA_{C\!P} = [ -9 \pm 8\,(\rm stat.) \pm 5\,(\rm syst.) ] \times 10^{-4} $ for $μ$-tagged $D^0$ mesons. Combining these with previous LHCb results leads to $$ΔA_{C\!P} = ( -15.4 \pm 2.9) \times 10^{-4},$$ where the uncertainty includes both statistical and systematic contributions. The measured value differs from zero by more than five standard deviations. This is the first observation of $C\!P$ violation in the decay of charm hadrons.