Observation of B_{c}^{+}→Dh^{+}h^{-} Decays

Area of Science:

• Particle Physics
• High Energy Physics
• Hadron Spectroscopy

Background:

• The B_{c}^{+} meson is a unique system containing both a charm and a bottom quark.
• Understanding its decays provides insights into the Standard Model and potential new physics.
• Previous studies have explored various B_{c}^{+} decay modes, but specific channels involving charmed mesons and multiple hadrons remained unobserved.

Purpose of the Study:

• To search for and characterize new B_{c}^{+}→Dh^{+}h^{-} decay modes.
• To measure the branching fractions of these newly observed decays.
• To investigate the underlying dynamics and resonances contributing to these decays and their potential for CP violation studies.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of proton-proton collision data collected by the LHCb experiment.
• Utilizing an integrated luminosity of 9 fb^{-1}.
• Employing sophisticated data analysis techniques to identify and reconstruct the B_{c}^{+}→Dh^{+}h^{-} decay channels.

Main Results:

• Observation of three new B_{c}^{+} decays: B_{c}^{+}→D^{+}K^{+}π^{-}, B_{c}^{+}→D^{*+}K^{+}π^{-}, and B_{c}^{+}→D_{s}^{+}K^{+}K^{-}.
• Measurement of their branching fractions relative to the B_{c}^{+}→B_{s}^{0}π^{+} decay.
• Identification of contributions from excited K^{0}, D^{0} resonances, or ϕ mesons in these decay channels.

Conclusions:

• The discovery of these decay modes significantly expands the known B_{c}^{+} decay landscape.
• The observed channels provide new opportunities to study charge-parity (CP) violation in the beauty meson system.
• These results contribute to a deeper understanding of heavy quarkonium physics and the strong interaction.