Effect of deuteron breakup on the deuteron-$\Xi$ correlation function

TL;DR

This study investigates how the breakup of deuterons influences the deuteron-Xi correlation function, revealing a modest but notable enhancement primarily due to neutron-neutron continuum states, using a quantum-mechanical three-body reaction model.

Contribution

It introduces a quantum-mechanical three-body reaction model to quantify the deuteron breakup effect on the deuteron-Xi correlation function, which was not considered in previous studies.

Findings

Deuteron breakup enhances the correlation function by 6-8% at low relative momentum.

Low-lying neutron-neutron continuum states are responsible for the enhancement.

The effect is significant but not dominant, justifying neglecting it in some analyses.

Abstract

The hadron-deuteron correlation function has attracted many interests as a potential method to access the three-hadron interactions. However, the weakly-bound nature of deuteron has not been considered in the preceding studies. In this study, the breakup effect of deuteron on the deuteron-$\Xi^-$ ($d$-$\Xi^-$) correlation function $C_{d\Xi^-}$ is investigated. The $d$-$\Xi^-$ scattering is described by a nucleon-nucleon-$\Xi$ three-body reaction model. The continuum-discretized coupled-channels method, which is a fully quantum-mechanical and non-perturbative reaction model, is adopted. $C_{d\Xi^-}$ turns out to be sensitive to the strong interaction and enhanced by the deuteron breakup effect by 6--8 % for the $d$-$\Xi^-$ relative momentum below about 70 MeV/$c$. Low-lying neutron-neutron continuum states are responsible for this enhancement. Within the adopted model, the deuteron breakup effect on $C_{d\Xi^-}$ is found to be appreciable but not very significant. Except for the enhancement by several percent, studies on $C_{d\Xi^-}$ without the deuteron breakup effect can be justified.