Measurements of $D^{0}$ and $D^{*}$ Production in $p$ + $p$ Collisions at $\sqrt{s}$ = 200 GeV

TL;DR

This paper reports measurements of $D^{0}$ and $D^{*}$ meson production in proton-proton collisions at 200 GeV, providing data on charm production cross sections and comparing results with perturbative QCD predictions.

Contribution

First measurement of $D^{0}$ and $D^{*}$ production cross sections at 200 GeV in $p$ + $p$ collisions, with comparison to theoretical calculations.

Findings

Charm-pair production cross section at mid-rapidity is 170 ± 45 (stat.) +38/-59 (sys.) μb.

Transverse momentum differential cross section aligns with the upper bound of FONLL calculations.

Results support perturbative QCD predictions for charm production at this energy.

Abstract

We report measurements of charmed-hadron ($D^{0}$, $D^{*}$) production cross sections at mid-rapidity in $p$ + $p$ collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 200 GeV by the STAR experiment. Charmed hadrons were reconstructed via the hadronic decays $D^{0}\rightarrow K^{-}\pi^{+}$, $D^{*+}\rightarrow D^{0}\pi^{+}\rightarrow K^{-}\pi^{+}\pi^{+}$ and their charge conjugates, covering the $p_T$ range of 0.6$-$2.0 GeV/$c$ and 2.0$-$6.0 GeV/$c$ for $D^{0}$ and $D^{*+}$, respectively. From this analysis, the charm-pair production cross section at mid-rapidity is $d\sigma/dy|_{y=0}^{c\bar{c}}$ = 170 $\pm$ 45 (stat.) $^{+38}_{-59}$ (sys.) $\mu$b. The extracted charm-pair cross section is compared to perturbative QCD calculations. The transverse momentum differential cross section is found to be consistent with the upper bound of a Fixed-Order Next-to-Leading Logarithm calculation.