Inclusive $D^0$ and $D^*\pm$ Production in Deep Inelastic $ep$ Collisions at HERA

TL;DR

This paper reports the first measurements of inclusive D0 and D* meson production in deep inelastic electron-proton scattering at HERA, showing good agreement with QCD predictions and providing new insights into charm production and the proton structure function.

Contribution

It presents the first experimental results on inclusive D0 and D* production in deep inelastic scattering, including cross sections and charm contribution to the proton structure function, aligning with QCD models.

Findings

Measured charm production cross section of 17.4 nb with uncertainties.

First determination of the charm contribution F2_charm to the proton structure function.

Observed ratio F2_charm/F2 of approximately 0.237 in the specified kinematic range.

Abstract

First results on inclusive D0 and D* production in deep inelastic $ep$ scattering are reported using data collected by the H1 experiment at HERA in 1994. Differential cross sections are presented for both channels and are found to agree well with QCD predictions based on the boson gluon fusion process. A charm production cross section for 10 GeV$^2\le Q^2\le100$~GeV$^2$ and $0.01\le y\le0.7$ of $\sigma(ep\to c\barcX) = (17.4 \pm 1.6 \pm 1.7 \pm 1.4)$~nb is derived. A first measurement of the charm contribution F2_charm(x,Q^2) to the proton structure function for Bjorken $x$ between $8\cdot10^{-4}$ and $8\cdot10^{-3}$ is presented. In this kinematic range a ratio F2_charm/F2= 0.237\pm0.021{+0.043\atop-0.039}$ is observed.