Measurement of electrons from Heavy Quarks in PHENIX

TL;DR

PHENIX measured electrons from heavy quarks across different collision systems and energies, revealing suppression patterns in heavy ion collisions that challenge existing energy loss models.

Contribution

This study provides comprehensive measurements of heavy flavor electron spectra in various collision systems and energies, establishing a baseline and revealing suppression phenomena.

Findings

Strong suppression of electrons in Au+Au collisions at 200 GeV

Baseline heavy flavor production in p+p collisions

Intermediate measurements in Cu+Cu and at lower energies

Abstract

Measurement of electrons from heavy quarks by PHENIX has been done for various collision species and energy.PHENIX has measured single electron spectra from heavy flavor decays in Au+Au collisions at $sqrt{S_{NN}} = 200$ GeV.The measurement of heavy flavor production for p + p in PHENIX has also been measured which provided the baseline for studying hot and dense matter effects in heavy ion reactions. In Au + Au we observe a strong suppression of single electron compared with scaled p + p which challenges radiative energy loss models because heavy quarksare expected to radiate less than light quarks. Measurements done in Cu + Cu collisions by PHENIX provide a measurement for species of intermediate size between p + p and Au + Au, while measurements in Au + Au collisions at $sqrt{S_{NN} = 62.4}$ GeV provide a measurement at lower energy.