Dead cone due to parton virtuality

TL;DR

This paper derives a general expression for the dead cone effect caused by parton virtuality, revealing significant suppression in heavy-ion collisions that may explain similar jet suppression patterns for light and heavy quarks.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive formula for the dead cone due to parton virtuality, extending understanding beyond conventional mass-based dead cones.

Findings

Virtuality-induced dead cone causes larger suppression than conventional dead cone.

High virtuality leads to significant radiative suppression in heavy-ion collisions.

Virtuality effects may explain similar suppression patterns of light and heavy quark jets.

Abstract

A general expression for the dead cone of gluons radiated by virtual partons has been derived. The conventional dead cone for massive on-shell quarks and the dead cone for the massless virtual partons have been obtained by using different limits of the general expression. Radiative suppression due to the virtuality of initial parton jets in Heavy-Ion Collisions (HIC) has been discussed. It is observed that the suppression caused by the high virtuality is overwhelmingly large as compared to that on account of conventional dead-cone of heavy quarks. The dead cone due to virtuality may play a crucial role in explaining the observed similar suppression patterns of light and heavy quarks jets in heavy ion collisions at Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC).