Electron Spectra for D and B Meson Semi-leptonic Decays at RHIC from PYTHIA with Modified Heavy Quark Fragmentation

2004/12/09 by Xiaoyan Lin, Lin, Xiaoyan
Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph) #High-Energy Particle Collisions Research #Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies #Quantum Chromodynamics and Particle Interactions #hep-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.hep-ph/0412124

5 pages, 4 figures, 1 table

arxiv created 2004/12/09 · openalex publication_date 2004/12/09 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We present a study of charmed hadron transverse momentum distribution from p+p collisions at √s_NN=200 GeV using the PYTHIA Monte Carlo event generator. The PHENIX tuned PYTHIA parameter set based on electron measurements alone yields a D meson p_T distribution softer than the preliminary STAR experimental data from d+Au collisions scaled by the number of binary collisions. In order to match the STAR p_T spectrum, the higher order QCD effects in PYTHIA have to be taken into account, and a fragmentation function of charm quarks much harder than the default Peterson function is needed. Electrons from beauty quark semi-leptonic decays are found significantly below the contribution from charm quark decays for the p_T region up to 8 GeV/c in our modified fragmentation scheme, while in the default fragmentation scheme the B decay electrons dominate at p_T above 4 GeV/c. We propose an experimental measurement of electron and charged hadron correlation to differentiate these scenarios.

Related

• Non-Photonic Electron p_T Distributions and Correlations of Electrons from B and D Meson Decays with Charged Hadrons
• Heavy flavor physics at STAR
• New mechanisms of charm production
• Measurement of charm production cross-section and leptons from its semileptonic decay at RHIC
• Production of charm and bottom quarks in p+p collisions at 200GeV