Measurements of the branching fractions of $B^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+}$ decays

TL;DR

This paper measures the branching fractions of the decay $B^{+} o p ar p K^{+}$, including intermediate states, using LHCb data, providing precise ratios and upper limits for various charmonium contributions.

Contribution

The study provides the first detailed measurements of branching fractions for $B^{+} o p ar p K^{+}$ decays with intermediate states, including new upper limits on rare charmonium-like states.

Findings

Total branching fraction ratio: 4.91 ± 0.19 (stat) ± 0.14 (syst)

Charmless component branching ratio: 2.02 ± 0.10 (stat) ± 0.08 (syst)

Branching ratios for $ o ext{η}_c(1S)$ and $ o ext{ψ}(2S)$ states with specified ratios

Abstract

The branching fractions of the decay $B^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+}$ for different intermediate states are measured using data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $1.0 fb^{-1}$, collected by the LHCb experiment. The total branching fraction, its charmless component $(M_{p\bar p} <2.85 {GeV/}c^{2})$ and the branching fractions via the resonant $c\bar c$ states $\eta_{c}(1S)$ and $\psi(2S)$ relative to the decay via a $J/\psi$ intermediate state are {align*} \frac{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})_{total}}{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to J/\psi K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})}=& \, 4.91 \pm 0.19 \, {(\rm stat)} \pm 0.14 \, {(\rm syst)}, \frac{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})_{M_{p\bar p} <2.85 {GeV/}c^{2}}}{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to J/\psi K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})}=& \, 2.02 \pm 0.10 \, {(\rm stat)}\pm 0.08 \, {(\rm syst)}, \frac{{\mathcal B} (B^{+} \to \eta_{c}(1S) K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})}{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to J/\psi K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})} = & \, 0.578 \pm 0.035 \, {(\rm stat)} \pm 0.027 \, {(\rm syst)}, \frac{{\mathcal B} (B^{+} \to \psi(2S) K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})}{{\mathcal B}(B^{+} \to J/\psi K^{+} \to p \bar p K^{+})}=& \, 0.080 \pm 0.012 \, {(\rm stat)} \pm 0.009 \, {(\rm syst)}. {align*} Upper limits on the $B^{+}$ branching fractions into the $\eta_{c}(2S)$ meson and into the charmonium-like states X(3872) and X(3915) are also obtained.