Measurements of the Branching Fractions of Charged B Decays to K+ pi- pi+ Final States

TL;DR

This paper reports measurements of branching fractions for various charged B meson decays to K+ pi- pi+ final states, using data from the BaBar detector, providing new quantitative insights into these decay processes.

Contribution

First measurements of specific branching fractions for charged B decays to K+ pi- pi+ final states with detailed resonance analysis and systematic uncertainties.

Findings

Measured branching fractions for B+ decays to K*0 pi+, f0 K+, chi_c0 K+, and D0bar pi+.

Set 90% confidence upper limits on B+ to rho K+ and non-resonant K+ pi- pi+ decays.

Provided detailed resonance and interference effects in the Dalitz plot analysis.

Abstract

We present preliminary results of searches for exclusive charged-B decays to K+ pi- pi+ from 61.6 million BBbar pairs collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the BaBar detector at the SLAC PEP-II asymmetric B Factory. The Dalitz plot is divided into eight regions and, using a maximum-likelihood fit, we measure statistically significant yields in all regions. We interpret the results as the following branching fractions averaged over charged--conjugate states: B+ --> K*0 pi+, K*0 --> K+ pi- = (10.3 +/- 1.2 +1.0 -2.7) x 10^-6, B+ --> f0 K+, f_0 --> pi+ pi- = (9.2 +/- 1.2 +2.1 -2.6) x 10^-6, B+ --> chi_c0 K+, chi_c0 --> pi+ pi- = (1.46 +/- 0.35 +/- 0.12) x 10^-6 and B+ --> D0bar pi+, D0bar --> K+ pi- = (184.6 +/- 3.2 +/- 9.7) x 10^-6. The first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic and includes resonance--model and interference uncertainties. We give 90% confidence upper limits on the branching fractions of the following channels: B+ --> rho K+ < 6.2 x 10^-6 and B+ --> K+ pi- pi+ non-resonant < 17 x 10^-6.