Energy loss for heavy quarks in relation to light partons; is radiative energy loss for heavy quarks anomalous?

TL;DR

This paper compares jet suppression in heavy-ion collisions for electrons and pions, finding that radiative energy loss explains the data for both, with less quenching for heavy quarks, supporting the dominance of radiative mechanisms.

Contribution

It provides evidence that radiative energy loss is the main mechanism for jet quenching in both heavy and light partons, with consistent estimates of the transport coefficient.

Findings

Jet suppression measurements are consistent with radiative energy loss for both heavy and light partons.

Less quenching observed for heavy quarks, indicating mass-dependent energy loss effects.

Transport coefficient estimates from heavy quark data agree with those from light parton quenching.

Abstract

The scaling properties of jet suppression measurements are compared for non-photonic electrons ($e^{\pm}$) and neutral pions ($\pi^0$) in Au + Au collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=200$ GeV. For a broad range of transverse momenta and collision centralities, the comparison is consistent with jet quenching dominated by radiative energy loss for both heavy and light partons. Less quenching is indicated for heavy quarks via $e^{\pm}$; this gives an independent estimate of the transport coefficient $\hat{q}$ that agrees with its magnitude obtained from quenching of light partons via $\pi^0$'s.