Measurement of Bottom versus Charm as a Function of Transverse Momentum with Electron-Hadron Correlations in p+p Collisions at sqrt(s)=200 GeV

The PHENIX collaboration Adare, A. ; Afanasiev, S. ; Aidala, C. ; et al.
Phys.Rev.Lett. 103 (2009) 082002, 2009.
Inspire Record 816469 DOI 10.17182/hepdata.57326

The momentum distribution of electrons from semi-leptonic decays of charm and bottom for mid-rapidity |y|<0.35 in p+p collisions at sqrt(s)=200 GeV is measured by the PHENIX experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) over the transverse momentum range 2 < p_T < 7 GeV/c. The ratio of the yield of electrons from bottom to that from charm is presented. The ratio is determined using partial D/D^bar --> e^{+/-} K^{-/+} X (K unidentified) reconstruction. It is found that the yield of electrons from bottom becomes significant above 4 GeV/c in p_T. A fixed-order-plus-next-to-leading-log (FONLL) perturbative quantum chromodynamics (pQCD) calculation agrees with the data within the theoretical and experimental uncertainties. The extracted total bottom production cross section at this energy is \sigma_{b\b^bar}= 3.2 ^{+1.2}_{-1.1}(stat) ^{+1.4}_{-1.3}(syst) micro b.

6 data tables

Bottom contribution to the electrons from heavy flavor decay as a function of PT. These values has been obtained using g3data software which to extract the data from the plot and should therefore be used with caution. The g3data program indicates an extra uncertainty of 0.01 on these values.

Differential bottom production cross section at mid rapidity (y=0) To obtain this value, the differential "bottom-decay" electrons cross-section has been extrapolated to PT=0 using the spectrum shape predicted by pQCD. The b->e branching ratio used was 10 +-1%.

Invariant cross section of electrons from heavy flavor decay versus PT These values has been obtained using g3data software which to extract the data from the plot and should therefore be used with caution. The values in the last column indicate the level of uncertainty intoduced by g3data.

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