Double open charm meson production at the LHC: new single- and double-parton scattering mechanisms

¹ Institute of Nuclear Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Radzikowskiego 152, PL-31-342 Kraków, Poland
² University of Rzeszów, PL-35-959 Rzeszów, Poland

^* e-mail: rafal.maciula@ifj.edu.pl.pl, supported by the Polish National Science Center grant DEC-2014/15/B/ST2/02528

Published online: 29 November 2016

Abstract

We discuss D⁰D⁰ meson-meson pair production related to the recent LHCb experimental results obtained at √s = 7 TeV. We consider double-parton scattering (DPS) mechanisms of double cc̄ production and subsequent standard cc → D⁰D⁰ scale-independent hadronization as well as double g and mixed gcc̄ production with gg → D⁰D⁰ and gc → D⁰D⁰ scale-dependent hadronization. The latter scenario with g → D⁰ fragmentation components results in a new single-parton scattering (SPS) mechanism of digluon production which is also taken here into account. Results of the numerical calculations are compared with the LHCb data for correlation observables in azimuthal angle φ_D⁰D⁰ between D⁰ mesons, in dimeson invariant mass M_D⁰D⁰ and in transverse momentum of the meson from the D⁰D⁰ pair. The inclusion of the new mechanisms with g → D⁰ fragmentation leads to a larger cross sections and to slightly different shapes of the calculated correlation observables.