Dragging $D$ mesons by hot hadrons

TL;DR

This paper calculates the drag and diffusion coefficients of D mesons in a hot hadronic medium, revealing significant interactions that could affect experimental signals in high-energy nuclear collisions.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed evaluation of heavy meson transport coefficients in a hot hadronic environment using effective field theory.

Findings

Transport coefficients are substantial, indicating strong interactions.

Results suggest notable effects on heavy meson decay signals.

Potential impact on interpreting nuclear collision experiments.

Abstract

We evaluate the drag and diffusion coefficients of a hot hadronic medium consisting of pions, nucleons, kaons and eta using open charm mesons as a probe. The interaction of the probe with the hadronic matter has been treated in the framework of effective field theory. It is observed that the magnitude of both the transport coefficients are significant, indicating substantial amount of interaction of the heavy mesons with the thermal hadronic system. The results may have noticeable impact on the experimental observable like the suppression of single electron spectra originating form the decays of heavy mesons in nuclear collisions at relativistic energies.