Branching Fraction Measurements of the Color-Suppressed Decays B0bar to D(*)0 pi0, D(*)0 eta, D(*)0 omega, and D(*)0 eta_prime and Measurement of the Polarization in the Decay B0bar to D*0 omega

TL;DR

This paper presents precise measurements of branching fractions for color-suppressed B0bar decays to various D(*)0 and light mesons, and reports the first polarization measurement in B0bar to D*0 omega, comparing results with theoretical models.

Contribution

It provides the most precise single-experiment measurements of these decay modes and polarization, and offers insights into final state interactions and theoretical model validity.

Findings

Branching fractions measured with high precision.

First polarization measurement of D*0 omega decay.

Results favor models with final state interactions, aligning better with SCET.

Abstract

We report updated branching fraction measurements of the color-suppressed decays B0bar to D0 pi0, D*0 pi0, D0 eta, D*0 eta, D0 omega, D*0 omega, D0 eta_prime, and D*0 eta_prime. We measure the branching fractions (*10^-4): BF(B0bar to D0 pi0) = 2.69 +/- 0.09 +/- 0.13, BF(B0bar to D*0 pi0) = 3.05 +/- 0.14 +/- 0.28, BF(B0bar to D0 eta) = 2.53 +/- 0.09 +/- 0.11, BF(B0bar to D*0 eta) = 2.69 +/- 0.14 +/- 0.23, BF(B0bar to D0 omega) = 2.57 +/- 0.11 +/- 0.14, BF(B0bar to D*0 omega) = 4.55 +/- 0.24 +/- 0.39, BF(B0bar to D0 eta_prime) = 1.48 +/- 0.13 +/- 0.07,and BF(B0bar to D*0 eta_prime) = 1.49 +/- 0.22 +/- 0.15. We also present the first measurement of the longitudinal polarization fraction of the decay channel D*0 omega, f_L = (66.5+/- 4.7+/- 1.5) %. In the above, the first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic. The results are based on a sample of (454 +/- 5)*10^6 BBbar pairs collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance, with the BaBar detector at the PEP-II storage rings at SLAC. The measurements are the most precise determinations of these quantities from a single experiment. They are compared to theoretical predictions obtained by factorization, Soft Collinear Effective Theory (SCET) and perturbative QCD (pQCD). We find that the presence of final state interactions is favored and the measurements are in better agreement with SCET than with pQCD.