Using proton-proton collision data collected by the CMS experiment at $\sqrt{s}$ = 13 TeV in 2016$-$2018, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 140 fb$^{-1}$, the first full reconstruction of the three vector B meson states, B$^{*+}$, B$^{*0}$, and B$^{*0}_\text{s}$, is performed. The mass differences between the excited mesons and their corresponding ground states are measured to be $m(\text{B}^{*+})-m(\text{B}^+)$ = 45.277 $\pm$ 0.039 $\pm$ 0.027 MeV, $m(\text{B}^{*0})- m(\text{B}^0)$ = 45.471 $\pm$ 0.056 $\pm$ 0.028 MeV, and $m(\text{B}^{*0}_\text{s})-m(\text{B}_\text{s})$ = 49.407 $\pm$ 0.132 $\pm$ 0.041 MeV, where the first uncertainties are statistical and the second are systematic. These results improve on the precision of previous measurements by an order of magnitude.
The measured mass differences between vector and ground B meson states.
Extracted masses of $\mathrm{B}^{*+}$, $\mathrm{B}^{*0}$, and $\mathrm{B}^{*0}_{\mathrm{s}}$ mesons. The values are obtained using the measurements in Table 1 and the ground state masses from PDG 2024 (S. Navas et al. (Particle Data Group), Phys. Rev. D 110, 030001 (2024)), which are the source of the last uncertainties.
Extracted mass differences between vector B meson states of different flavour. The values are obtained using the measurements in Table 4 and the ground state mass differences from PDG 2024 (S. Navas et al. (Particle Data Group), Phys. Rev. D 110, 030001 (2024)), which are the source of the last uncertainties.
The traditional quark model accounts for the existence of baryons, such as protons and neutrons, which consist of three quarks, as well as mesons, composed of a quark-antiquark pair. Only recently has substantial evidence started to accumulate for exotic states composed of four or five quarks and antiquarks. The exact nature of their internal structure remains uncertain. This paper reports the first measurement of quantum numbers of the recently discovered family of three all-charm tetraquarks, using data collected by the CMS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider from 2016 to 2018. The angular analysis techniques developed for the discovery and characterization of the Higgs boson have been applied to the new exotic states. The quantum numbers for parity $P$ and charge conjugation $C$ symmetries are found to be +1. The spin $J$ of these exotic states is consistent with 2$\hbar$, while 0$\hbar$ and 1$\hbar$ are excluded at 95% and 99% confidence level, respectively. The $J^{PC}=2^{++}$ assignment implies particular configurations of constituent spins and orbital angular momenta, which constrain the possible internal structure of these tetraquarks.
Summary of statistical tests.
Results from hypothesis test for pairs of spin-parity models.
The $\mathrm{J}/\psi\mathrm{J}/\psi$ invariant mass distribution in data.