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Physics
Letters
B
www.elsevier.com/locate/physletb
Measuring
K
0
S
K
±
interactions
using
pp
collisions
at
√
s
=
7 TeV
.
ALICE
Collaboration
a
r
t
i
c
l
e
i
n
f
o
a
b
s
t
r
a
c
t
Article history:Received27September2018
Receivedinrevisedform28November2018 Accepted13December2018
Availableonline18December2018 Editor:L.Rolandi
We presentthefirstmeasurements offemtoscopiccorrelationsbetweentheK0
S and K±particlesinpp
collisions at √s=7 TeV measured by the ALICE experiment. The observed femtoscopic correlations are consistentwith final-stateinteractionsproceeding solelyviathe a0(980) resonance.Theextracted
kaon source radius and correlation strength parameters for K0
SK− are found to be equal within the
experimental uncertainties to those forK0
SK+.Results ofthe present study are comparedwith those
fromidentical-kaonfemtoscopicstudiesalsoperformedwithppcollisionsat√s=7 TeVbyALICEand withaK0SK±measurementinPb–Pbcollisionsat√sNN=2.76 TeV.CombinedwiththePb–Pbresults,our
ppanalysisisfoundtobecompatiblewiththeinterpretationofthea0(980)havingatetraquarkstructure
insteadofthatofadiquark.
©2018PublishedbyElsevierB.V.ThisisanopenaccessarticleundertheCCBYlicense (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).FundedbySCOAP3.
1. Introduction
Recently, by using Pb–Pb collisions at
√
sNN=
2.
76 TeV, the ALICEexperiment [1] has published the first-everstudy ofK0SK± femtoscopy [2].K0SK±femtoscopydiffersfromidentical-kaon fem-toscopy,forwhichanumberofstudiesexistintheliterature [3–6], in that the only pair interaction expected is a final-state inter-action (FSI)through the a0(
980)
resonance. It was found in that Pb–Pb study that the FSI in K0SK± proceeds solely through thea0
(
980)
resonance,i.e.withnocompetingnon-resonant channels,andtheextractedkaonsourceparametersagreewithpublished re-sultsfromidentical-kaonstudiesinPb–Pbcollisions.Theseresults werefoundtobecompatiblewiththeinterpretationofthea0 res-onance asatetraquark state ratherthana diquark1 state [2,7–9].
A recenttheoretical calculation has shown that the ALICEPb–Pb results can indeed be described by a model based on the four-quarkmodel [10].
TheargumentgiveninRef. [2] fora tetraquarka0 being
com-patiblewiththePb–PbK0SK± resultstatedabove isbasedontwo factors: 1) the kaon source geometry, and2) an empirical selec-tionrule(for thesake ofsimplicityofnotation, “a0”willbeused
fortheremainder ofthispapertorepresent“a0
(
980)
”). Forfactor1),theproductioncrosssection ofthea0 resonanceinareaction channel such as K0K−
→
a−0 should depend on whether the a−0is composed of du or dssu quarks, the former requiring the an-nihilation of the ss pairand the latterbeing a direct transfer of
E-mail address:alice-publications@cern.ch.
1 Notethattheterm“diquark”willbeusedinthispapertoindicatea
q
iqjquark
pair.
the valence quarks from the kaons to the a−0. Since the femto-scopicsizeofthe0–10%mostcentralPb–Pbcollisionismeasured tobe5–6fm,thelargegeometryinthesecollisionsisfavorablefor the directtransfer ofquarksto thea0, whereasnot favorable for
theannihilationofthestrangequarksduetotheshort-ranged na-tureof thestronginteraction. Forfactor2), thedirect transferof thevalencequarksfromthekaons tothea−0 isfavoredsincethis is an “OZIsuperallowed” reaction [9].The OZIrule canbe stated as “an inhibition associated with the creation or annihilation of quark lines” [9]. Thus, the annihilation of the strange quarks is suppressedbytheOZIrule.Both ofthesefactorsfavorthe forma-tionofatetraquark a0 andsuppresstheformationofadiquark a0.
As a resultof this, if the a0 were a diquark, one would expect competingnon-resonantchannelspresentand/or noFSIatall,i.e. free-streaming, ofthe kaonpairthus diluting thestrength ofthe
a0 resonant FSI. The fact that this isnot seen to be the casein Pb–Pbcollisionsfavorsthetetraquarka0 interpretation.
Thegeometryofthekaonsourceisseentobeanimportant fac-torintheargumentgivenabove,i.e.thelargekaonsourceseenin Pb–Pb collisionssuppressestheannihilationofthestrange quarks in the kaon pair and enhances the direct transfer of quarks to the a0. It is interesting to speculate on the dependence of the
strength of the a0 resonant FSI on the size of the kaon source,
particularlyfora verysmallsourceofsize
∼
1 fm that wouldbe obtainedin pp collisions[4,5]. Fora kaonsource ofsize∼
1 fm, the kaons in a produced kaon pair would be overlapping with each otheratthesource,thusgivingageometricenhancementof thestrange-quarkannihilationchannelthatcouldcompetewith,or evendominateover,theOZIrulesuppressionofquarkannihilation. Thus we might expect that the tetraquark a0 resonant FSI could be diluted or completely suppressed by competingnon-resonanthttps://doi.org/10.1016/j.physletb.2018.12.033
annihilation channels that could open up, whereas a diquark a0
resonantFSI,whichwasnotseentobesuppressedbyeither geom-etryortheOZIruleinPb–Pb,wouldnotbediluted.Afemtoscopic measurementofK0SK±correlationsinppcollisionsshouldbeable totestthisbydeterminingthestrengthofthea0FSIbymeasuring
thefemtoscopic
λ
parameter. Inmoreconcreteterms,ifwe were tocomparetheλ
parametersextractedinK0SK±femtoscopic mea-surementsinppcollisionsandPb–Pbcollisions,foratetraquarka0wewouldexpect
λ
K0SK±(PbPb)
> λ
K0SK±(pp)whereasforadiquarka0we would expect
λ
K0SK±(PbPb)
∼ λ
KS0K±(pp). An independent checkcouldalsobemadeby comparing
λ
fromK0SK± femtoscopyinpp collisionswithλ
fromidentical-kaonfemtoscopyinppcollisionsin asimilarwayaswasdoneforPb–Pbcollisions [2].Sinceweexpect identical-kaoncorrelationstogosolelythroughquantumstatistics (and FSI for neutral kaons), our expectation for a tetraquark a0wouldbe
λ
K K(pp)> λ
K0SK±(pp)whereasforadiquark a0 wewould
expect
λ
K K(pp)∼ λ
K0SK±(pp).
In this Letter, femtoscopic correlations with the particle pair combinationsK0
SK± are studiedforthe first timein pp collisions
at
√
s=
7 TeVbythe ALICEexperiment.The physics goalsofthe presentK0SK±femtoscopystudyarethefollowing:1)showtowhat
extenttheFSIthrough thea0 resonancedescribesthecorrelation functions,2) studytheK0 andK0 sources tosee ifthereare dif-ferencesin the sourceparameters, 3) comparethe results ofthe extractedkaonsourceparametersfromthepresentstudywiththe publishedresultsfromPb–Pbcollisions andidenticalkaonresults from pp collisions, and 4) see if the results from this pp study arecompatiblewitha tetraquarka0 assuggestedfromthePb–Pb study.
2. Descriptionofexperimentanddataselection
The ALICEexperiment andits performance in the LHC Run1 (2009–2013) are described in Ref. [1] and Refs. [11,12], respec-tively.About 370
×
106 minimum-bias 7 TeV pp collision eventstakenin 2010 were used in this analysis. Events were classified using the measured amplitudes in the V0 detectors, which con-sistoftwo arraysof scintillatorslocated along thebeamline and covering the full azimuth [13,14]. Charged particles were recon-structed and identified with the central barrel detectors located within a solenoid magnet with a field strength of B
= ±
0.
5 T. ChargedparticletrackingwasperformedusingtheTimeProjection Chamber(TPC) [15] and the Inner Tracking System(ITS) [1]. The ITSallowedforhighspatialresolutionindeterminingtheprimary (collision)vertex. Amomentum resolutionof lessthan10MeV/c was typically obtained for the charged tracks of interest in this analysis [16]. The primary vertexwas obtainedfromthe ITS, the positionofthe primary vertexbeingconstrainedalong the beam direction(the “z-position”)tobe within±
10 cmofthecenterof theALICEdetector.Inadditiontothestandardtrackquality selec-tions [16], theselectionsbasedon thequalityoftrackfittingand thenumber ofdetected tracking points in the TPCwere used to ensurethatonlywell-reconstructedtracksweretakeninthe anal-ysis [11,15,16].Particleidentification(PID)forreconstructedtrackswascarried outusing boththe TPCandtheTime-of-Flight(TOF) detectorsin thepseudorapidityrange
|
η
|
<
0.
8 [11,12].ForthePIDsignalfrom both detectors, a value was assigned to each track denoting the number of standard deviations between the measured track in-formationandcalculatedvalues (Nσ )[6,11,12,16]. ForTPCPID,a parametrizedBethe–Blochformulawas usedtocalculatethe spe-cific energy loss dE/
dx in the detector expected for a particle withagivenmassandmomentum.ForPIDwithTOF,theparticlemasswas usedtocalculatetheexpectedtime-of-flightasa func-tionoftracklengthandmomentum.Thisprocedurewasrepeated forfour“particlespecieshypotheses”,i.e.electron,pion,kaonand proton,and,foreachhypothesis,adifferentNσ valuewasobtained perdetector.
2.1. Kaonselection
Themethods usedtoselectandidentifyindividual K0S andK± particles are the sameasthose used forthe ALICEK0
SK0S [4] and
K±K± [5] analyses from
√
s=
7 TeVppcollisions. Theseare now describedbelow.2.1.1. K0 Sselection
The K0
S particles were reconstructed from the decay K0S
→
π
+π
−,withthedaughterπ
+andπ
−tracksdetectedintheTPC, ITSandTOF detectors.The secondaryvertexfinderusedtolocate theneutralkaondecaysemployed the“on-the-fly”reconstruction method [16],whichrecalculatesthedaughtertrackmomenta dur-ing the original tracking process under the assumption that the tracks came from a decay vertex instead of the primary vertex. Pions with pT>
0.
15 GeV/c were accepted (since for lower pTtrack finding efficiency drops rapidly) and the distance of clos-est approach to the primary vertex (DCA) of the reconstructed K0S was requiredto be lessthan 0.3cmin alldirections. The re-quired Nσ valuesforthe pions were NTPC
σ
<
3 (forall momenta)and NTOF
σ
<
3 for p>
0.
8 GeV/c. An invariant mass distributionfor the
π
+π
− pairs was produced and the K0S was defined to be resulting from a pair that fell into the invariant mass range 0.
480<
mπ+π−<
0.
515 GeV/c2, corresponding to±
4.
7σ
, whereσ
=
3.
7 MeV/c2isthewidthofaGaussianfittotheinvariantmassdistribution.
2.1.2. K±selection
Chargedkaontracksweredetected usingtheTPCandTOF de-tectors, andwere accepted ifthey were within the range0
.
14<
pT
<
1.
2 GeV/c in order to obtain good PID. The determination ofthe momentaofthe trackswas performedusingtracks recon-structedwiththeTPConlyandconstrainedtotheprimaryvertex. In order to reduce the number of secondary tracks (for instance the chargedparticles produced inthe detectormaterial,particles fromweakdecays,etc.),theprimarychargedkaontrackswere se-lectedbasedontheDCA,suchthattheDCAtransversetothebeam directionwaslessthan2.4cmandtheDCAalongthebeam direc-tion was less than 3.2 cm. If the TOF signal were not available, the required Nσ valuesforthe chargedkaons were NTPCσ
<
2 for pT<
0.
5 GeV/c, andthe trackwasrejectedfor pT>
0.
5 GeV/c. Ifthe TOFsignal were also available and pT
>
0.
5 GeV/c: NTPCσ<
2 andNTOFσ<
2 (0.
5<
pT<
1.
2 GeV/c).TheK0SK±experimentalpairpuritywasestimatedfromaMonte Carlo(MC) studybasedon PYTHIA [17] simulationswiththe Pe-rugia2011 tune [18], and using GEANT3 [19] to model particle transportthroughtheALICEdetectors.Thepuritywasdetermined from the fraction of the reconstructed MC simulated pairs that were identified asknown K0
SK± pairs fromPYTHIA.The pair
pu-ritywas estimatedto be
∼
83% forall kinematicregions studied in thisanalysis. The single-particle puritiesfor K0S andK± parti-clesusedinthisanalysiswereestimatedtobe∼
92%and∼
91%, respectively.The uncertaintyincalculatingthepairpurityis esti-matedtobe±
1%.3. Analysismethods
3.1. Experimentalcorrelationfunctions
ThisanalysisstudiesthemomentumcorrelationsofK0SK±pairs usingthetwo-particlecorrelationfunction,definedas
C
(k
∗)
=
A(k∗
)
B(k∗
)
,
(1)where A
(
k∗)
isthemeasured distributionofpairsfromthesame event, B(
k∗)
is the reference distribution of pairs from mixed events,andk∗ isthemagnitudeofthemomentumofeachofthe particlesinthepairrestframe(PRF),k∗
=
(s
−
m2 K0−
m2K±)
2−
4m2K0m2K± 4s (2) where s=
m2K0+
m2K±+
2EK0EK±−
2pK0·
pK± (3)andmK0 (EK0)andmK± (EK±)aretherestmasses(total energies) oftheK0
S andK±,respectively.
Thedenominator B
(
k∗)
wasformedby mixingK0S andK± par-ticlesfromeacheventwithK± andK0S particles,respectively,from tenother events,whereeach eventhasatleastboth aK± anda K0S [2]. The vertices of the mixedevents were constrained to be
within2cmofeachotherinthez-direction.
Two-trackeffects, suchasthe mergingof tworeal tracksinto onereconstructedtrackandthesplittingofonerealtrackintotwo reconstructedtracks,isanimportantissueforfemtoscopicstudies. Thisanalysisdealtwiththeseeffectsusingthefollowingmethod. For each kaon pair, the distance between the K0S pion daughter trackandthesame-chargedK±trackwascalculatedatuptonine points throughouttheTPC(every 20cmfrom85cm to245cm) andthenaveraged.Comparingpairsfromthesameeventtothose frommixed events,one observes a splittingpeak foran average separationof
<
11 cm. Tocorrectforthis,thisanalysisdemanded thatthesame-charge particlesfromeachkaonpairmusthavean averageTPCseparationofatleast13cm.Mixed-eventtrackswere normalizedby subtracting theprimary vertexposition fromeach usedtrackpoint.Correlationfunctions were createdseparately forthe two dif-ferent charge combinations,K0SK+ and K0SK−, andforthree over-lapping/non-exclusive pair transverse momentum kT
= |
pT,1+
pT,2
|/
2 ranges: all kT, kT<
0.
85 and kT>
0.
85 GeV/c, where kT=
0.
85 GeV/c is the location of the peak of the kT distribu-tion.ThemeankTvaluesforthesethreebinswere0.66,0.49and 1.17 GeV/c, respectively. The raw K0SK+ correlation functions for
thesethreebinscomparedwiththosegeneratedfromPYTHIA sim-ulations withthe Perugia2011 tune and usingGEANT3 to model particletransportthroughtheALICEdetectorsareshowninFig.1. The PYTHIA correlation functions are normalized to the data in thevicinityofk∗
=
0.
8 GeV/c.TherawK0SK−correlationfunctions lookverysimilartothese.ItisseenthatalthoughPYTHIA qualita-tivelydescribesthetrendsofthebaselineofthedata,itdoesnot describeitquantitatively suchthat itcouldbe usedtomodelthe baseline directly.Instead,forthepresentanalysisthestrategy for dealingwiththebaselinewastodescribeitwithseveralfunctional formstobefittedtotheexperimentalcorrelationfunctionsandto usePYTHIA to test the appropriatenessof the proposed baseline functionalforms.Three functional forms for the baseline were tested with PYTHIA:quadratic,Gaussianandexponential,givenby
Fig. 1. RawK0
SK+ correlationfunctionsforthethree
k
T binscomparedwiththosefrom PYTHIA.Theerror barsarestatistical. Thescaleof C(k∗)is arbitrary.The PYTHIA correlationfunctionsarenormalized tothedata inthe vicinityof
k
∗= 0.8 GeV/c.Cquadratic
(k
∗)
=
a(1−
bk∗+
ck∗2)
(4)CGaussian
(k
∗)
=
a(1+
b exp(−
ck∗2))
(5)Cexponential
(k
∗)
=
a(1+
b exp(−
ck∗))
(6)where a, b and c are fit parameters. Fig.2 showsfits of Eq. (4), Eq. (5) and Eq. (6) to the PYTHIA correlation functions shown in Fig. 1 for the three kT ranges used in this analysis. As seen,
all three functionalforms do reasonablywell inrepresenting the PYTHIA correlation functions. Thus, all three forms were used in fittingthe experimentalcorrelation function andthe different re-sultsobtainedwillbeusedtoestimatethesystematicuncertainty due to the baseline estimation. Of course there are an infinite number offunctionsone could tryto representthe baseline,but atleast thethree thatwere chosen forthiswork are simpleand representativeofthreebasicfunctionalforms.
Correlationfunctionswere correctedformomentumresolution effectsusingPYTHIAcalculations.Theparticlemomentum resolu-tioninALICEfortherelativelylow-momentumtracksusedinthe present analysis was
<
10 MeV/c [1]. Two correlation functions were generatedwithPYTHIA:one intermsofthe generator-levelFig. 2. Comparisonsoffitsofthree possiblebaseline functionalformswith the PYTHIAcorrelationfunctionsthatwereshowninFig.1.Fitsweremadeinthe
k
∗ range0–0.8 GeV/c.ThescaleofC
(k∗)isarbitrary.PYTHIA does not incorporate final-state interactions, simulated femtoscopicweights were determined usinga 9th-order polyno-mial fitin k∗ to theexperimental correlation function forthe kT
range considered. When filling the same-event distributions, i.e.
A
(
k∗)
in Eq. (1), kaon pairs were individually weighted by this 9th-order fit according to their generator-level k∗. Then, the ra-tioofthe “ideal”correlation function to the“measured”one (for eachk∗ bin) was multipliedtothe datacorrelation functions be-forethe fitprocedure. Thiscorrection mostly affectedthe lowestk∗bins,increasingtheextractedsourceparametersby
∼
2%.3.2.Final-stateinteractionmodel
Thefinal-stateinteraction modelused inthepresentpp colli-sionanalysisfollowsthesameprinciplesastheonesusedforthe ALICEPb–Pbcollisionanalysis [2].ThemeasuredK0SK± correlation functionswere fit withformulas that include a parameterization whichincorporatesstrongFSI. Itwas assumedthat theFSIarises intheK0SK±channelsduetothenear-thresholdresonance,a0.This parameterizationwas introduced by R. Lednickyand isbased on the model by R. Lednicky and V.L. Lyuboshitz [20,21] (see also Ref. [3] formoredetailsonthisparameterization).
Using an equal emission time approximation in the PRF [20], the elastic K0SK± transition is written as a stationary solution
−k∗
(
r∗)
ofthescatteringprobleminthePRF.Thequantityr∗ rep-resentstheemissionseparationofthepairinthePRF,andthe−
k∗subscriptreferstoareversaloftimefromtheemissionprocess.At largedistancesthishastheasymptoticformofasuperpositionof anincomingplanewaveandanoutgoingsphericalwave,
−k∗
(
r∗)
=
e−ik∗·r∗+
f(k
∗)
eik∗r∗
r∗
,
(7)where f
(
k∗)
is the s-wave K0K− or K0K+ scattering amplitudewhose contribution is the s-wave isovector a0 resonance (see Eq. (11)inRef. [3])and
f
(k
∗)
=
γ
a0→KKm2a0
−
s−
i(γ
a0→KKk∗+
γ
a0→π ηkπ η)
.
(8)In Eq. (8), ma0 is the mass of the a0 resonance, and
γ
a0→KK andγa
0→π η are the couplings of the a0 resonance to the K0K− (or K0K+) and
π η
channels, respectively. Also, s=
4(
m2K0
+
k∗2)
Table 1
The
a
0massandcouplingparameters,allinGeV/c2,usedinthepresentstudy.Reference ma0 γa0→KK γa0→πη
Achasov2 [7] 1.003 0.8365 0.4580
andkπη denotesthemomentumintheseconddecaychannel(
π η
) (seeTable1).The correlation function due to the FSI is then calculated by integrating
−k∗
(
r∗)
intheKoonin–Prattequation [22,23],CFSI
(
k∗)
=
d3
r∗S(r∗)
−k∗
(
r∗)
2,
(9)where S
(
r∗)
isaone-dimensionalGaussiansourcefunctionofthe PRFrelativedistancer∗withaGaussianwidthR oftheformS(
r∗)
∼
e−r∗2/(4R2).
(10)Equation (9) can be integrated analytically for K0SK± correla-tionswithFSIfortheone-dimensionalcase,withtheresult
CFSI
(k
∗)
=
1+ λ
α
1 2 f(k
R∗)
2+
2R
√
f(k
∗)
π
R F1(
2k ∗R)−
I
f(k
∗)
R F2(
2k ∗R)+
C,
(11) where F1(z)
≡
√
π
e−z2erfi(z)
2z;
F2(z)
≡
1−
e−z2 z.
(12)Intheabove equations
α
isthefractionofK0SK± pairsthat come
from the K0K− or K0K+ system, set to 0.5 assuming symmetry
in K0 andK0 production[3], R istheradius parameter fromthe spherical Gaussian sourcedistribution givenin Eq. (10), and
λ
is the correlation strength. The correlation strength is unity in the idealcaseofpure a0-resonant FSI,perfectPID,aperfectGaussian kaon sourceand theabsence oflong-lived resonances which de-cayintokaons.ThetermC isa calculatedcorrection factorthat takesintoaccountthedeviationofthesphericalwave assumption usedinEq. (7) intheinnerregionoftheshort-rangepotential(see theAppendix inRef. [3]).Its effectontheextracted R and
λ
pa-rametersistoincrease themby∼
14%.Notethattheformofthe FSIterminEq. (11) differsfromtheformoftheFSItermforK0SK0S correlations(Eq. (9)ofRef. [3])byafactorof1/
2 duetothe non-identicalparticlesinK0SK±correlationsandthustheabsenceofthe
requirementtosymmetrizethewavefunctiongiveninEq. (7). AsseeninEq. (8),theK0K−orK0K+ s-wavescattering ampli-tudedependsonthea0massanddecaycouplings.FromtheALICE
Pb–Pb collision K0SK± study [2], it was found that source param-etersextractedwiththe“Achasov2”parameters ofRef. [7] agreed bestwiththeidenticalkaonmeasurements,thusinthepresentpp collisionstudyonlythe Achasov2parameters areused.These pa-rameters areshown inTable1. Sincethe correction factor
C is
foundtomainlydependon
γ
a0KK¯ [3],itisjudgedthatthe system-aticuncertaintyonthecalculationofC isnegligible.
The experimental K0
SK± correlation functions, calculated using
Eq. (1),werefitwiththeexpression
C
(k
∗)
=
CFSI(k
∗)C
baseline(k
∗),
(13)whereCbaseline
(
k∗)
isEq. (4),Eq. (5) orEq. (6).The fitting strategy used was to carry out a 5-parameter fit ofEq. (13) tothe K0SK± experimental correlation functionsto ex-tractR,
λ
,a, b andc foreachofthesix(kT range)–(chargestate)Fig. 3. CorrelationfunctionsdividedbyoneofthebaselinefunctionswithfitsfromEq. (13) forK0
SK+andK0SK−and
k
∗fitrange(0.0–0.6GeV/c)forthethreek
Tbinsandthequadraticbaselinefunctionassumption.Statistical(lines)andthequadraticsumofthestatisticalandsystematic(boxes)uncertaintiesareshown.For
k
∗>0.05 GeV/c, thesystematicuncertaintiesbecomenegligibleandtheboxesarenolongershown.Fig. 4. Sample raw correlation functions for K0
SK+showing the fitted quadratic baseline function, Eq. (4). Statistical uncertainties are shown. The scale of C(k∗)is arbitrary.
combinations.Foreach ofthesesixcombinations,thethree base-linefunctional forms,and two k∗ fit ranges,(0.0–0.6 GeV/c) and (0.0–0.8 GeV/c),werefit,givingsixR andsix
λ
parametervalues foreachcombination.Thesesixvalueswerethenaveragedandthe variance calculated to obtain the final values for the parameters andanestimateofthecombinedsystematicuncertaintiesfromthe baselineassumptionsandfitrange,respectively.4. Resultsanddiscussion
4.1. Fitstotheexperimentalcorrelationfunctions
Fig. 3 shows sample correlation functions divided by the quadraticbaselinefunctionwithfitsofEq. (13) forK0SK± andthe
k∗fitrange(0.0–0.6 GeV/c)forthethreekT bins.Thefitsusingthe
otherbaselineassumptionsandtothewiderrange(0.0–0.8 GeV/c) aresimilar inquality. Comparingwiththequadraticbaseline, us-ing theGaussian baseline tends togive
∼
10–20% smallersource parameters whereas usingthe exponential baseline tends to give∼
10–20% larger source parameters. The averageχ
2/
ndf andp-value over all ofthe fitsare 1.554 and0.172, respectively. Statis-tical (lines)and the quadraticsum ofthe statistical and system-atic(boxes) uncertaintiesare shown.The systematicuncertainties were determined by varying cuts on the data (see the discus-sion of the “cut systematicuncertainty” in the section below on “Systematic Uncertainties”formore details). Fig. 4showssample raw correlationfunctionsfor K0
SK+ forthe threekT bins andthe
quadratic baselinefunction, Eq. (4), that was fitcorresponding to the 5-parameter fits of Eq. (13) to the K0
SK+ data presented in
Fig.3.Statisticaluncertaintiesonthefitparameterswereobtained byconstructingthe1
σ
λ
vs. R contourandtakingtheerrorstobe attheextremeextentsofthecontour.Atypicalvalueofthe corre-lationcoefficientis0.642.Thismethodgivesthemostconservative estimatesofthestatisticaluncertainties.The Achasov2 a0 FSI parameterization coupled with the
vari-ousbaselineassumptionsgivesagoodrepresentationofthesignal regionofthedata,i.e.reproducingtheenhancementinthek∗ re-gion0.0–0.1 GeV/c andthesmalldipintheregion0.1–0.3 GeV/c. A good representation of the signal region was also seen to be the case for the Pb–Pb analysis with the Achasov2
parameteri-Table 2
Fitresultsforaverage
R and
λshowingstatisticalandsystematicuncertaintiesfromK0SK±femtoscopywithppcollisionsat √
s=7 TeV.The“[+/−]”inthefirstcolumn referstoK0
SK+orK 0
SK−.Seethetextforthedefinitionsofthevariousuncertainties.
R orλ[+/−] kTcut (GeV/c) Fit value Statistical uncert. Fit systematic uncert. Cut systematic uncert. Total systematic uncert. Total quadratic uncert. R[+](fm) kT<0.85 0.905 0.063 0.243 0.033 0.245 0.253 kT>0.85 0.788 0.077 0.168 0.031 0.171 0.188 All kT 0.922 0.048 0.188 0.038 0.192 0.198 λ[+] kT<0.85 0.189 0.046 0.070 0.012 0.071 0.085 kT>0.85 0.222 0.080 0.066 0.015 0.068 0.105 All kT 0.242 0.046 0.066 0.020 0.069 0.083 R[−](fm) kT<0.85 1.039 0.060 0.244 0.039 0.247 0.254 kT>0.85 0.786 0.082 0.145 0.032 0.148 0.169 All kT 0.995 0.046 0.185 0.041 0.190 0.195 λ[−] kT<0.85 0.253 0.044 0.096 0.016 0.097 0.107 kT>0.85 0.208 0.084 0.038 0.016 0.042 0.094 All kT 0.277 0.038 0.074 0.023 0.078 0.087
zation, which has a qualitatively different k∗ dependence of the correlationfunctionthatisdominatedbyadipatlowk∗ (compare presentFig.3withFig. 2fromRef. [2]).Theenhancementseenfor thesmall-R systematlowk∗ isexpectedfromEq. (11) asa con-sequenceofthefirstterminthebracketsthat goesas1
/
R2.ThisdemonstratestheabilityofEq. (11) todescribetheFSIinboththe smallandlargesizeregimesasgoingthroughthea0resonance.
4.2.ExtractedR and
λ
parametersTheresultsforthe extractedaverage R and
λ
parameters and thestatisticalandsystematicuncertaintiesontheseforthepresent analysisofK0SK± femtoscopyfrom7TeV pp collisions areshown inTable2.Thestatisticaluncertaintiesgivenaretheaveragesover the6fits foreachcase. As canbe seen, R andλ
forK0SK+ agree
withinthestatisticaluncertaintieswiththoseforK0SK−inallcases.
4.3.Systematicuncertainties
Table 2 shows the total systematic uncertainties on the ex-tracted R and
λ
parameters. As is seen, formost casesthe total systematic uncertainty is larger than the statistical uncertainty. The total systematic uncertainty is broken down in Table 2 into two main contributions, the “fit systematicuncertainty” and the “cut systematic uncertainty”, andis the quadratic sum of these. The fitsystematic uncertaintyis the combinedsystematic uncer-tainty due to the various baseline assumptions and varying thek∗ fitrange,asdescribedearlier.Thecutsystematicuncertaintyis thesystematicuncertaintyrelatedtothevariouscutsmadeinthe dataanalysis.Todeterminethis,singleparticlecutswerevariedby
∼
10%,andthevaluechosenfortheminimumseparationdistance ofsame-sign tracks was varied by∼
20%. Taking the upper-limit valuesof thevariations tobe conservative,this ledto additional errorsof4% for R and8% forλ
.Asseeninthetable, thefit sys-tematicuncertaintydominatesoverthecutsystematicuncertainty inall cases,demonstratingthelarge uncertainties indetermining thenon-femtoscopicbaselineinppcollisions.The“totalquadratic uncertainty” is the quadratic sum of the “statistical uncertainty” columnandthe“totalsystematicuncertainty”column.4.4. ComparisonswithK0SK±resultsfromPb–Pbcollisionsat
√
sNN
=
2.
76 TeVandidentical-kaonresultsfromppcollisionsat√
s
=
7 TeVInthissection comparisonsofthepresentresultsfor R and
λ
withK0SK±measurementsfromALICE2.76 TeVPb–Pbcollisionsfor 0–10%centrality [2],andwithidentical-kaonmeasurements from ALICE7 TeV pp collisions [4,5] are presented.Since it is seen in Table 2that the extractedparameters forK0SK+ agree within the statisticaluncertainties withthoseforK0SK−inallcases,theseare averaged overweighted bythestatisticaluncertainties inthe fol-lowingfigures.
Fig. 5 shows the comparison with the ALICE Pb–Pb collision K0SK± measurements.The
λ
parameters havebeendividedby the pairpurityforeachcase,i.e.83%forthepresentppcollisionsand 88% for the Pb–Pb collisions [2], so that they can be compared onthesamebasis.Itisseenthat R for0–10%centralityPb–Pb is∼
5 fm,andissignificantlylargerthantheR∼
1 fmmeasuredfor pp collisions. Thisisexpectedsince R reflectsthe geometric size oftheinteractionregionofthecollision.Itissomewhatsurprising thatλ
forppcollisionsisseentobesignificantlylessthanthatfor Pb–Pbcollisions.Therearetwomainfactorseffectingthevalueof theλ
parameter:1)thedegreetowhichaGaussianfitsthe corre-lationfunction and2) theeffectoflong-livedresonancesdiluting thekaonsample. For1),itisseeninFig.3forppandinFig. 2of Ref. [2] forPb–PbthattheGaussianfunctionusedintheLedincky equation,Eqs. (10) and(11),fitsbothcollidingsystemswell, mini-mizingtheeffectof1).For2),theK∗ decay(∼
50 MeV)hasthe largest influence on diluting the kaon sample, and it is unlikely that the multiplicity ratioof K/
K∗ changes dramaticallyin going from2.76 TeV to7 TeV. From theseargumentswe mightnaively expectλ
tobesimilarintheppandPb–Pbcases.In order to properly compare the present results with the ALICE pp collision identical-kaon measurements, we must take the weighted average (weightedby their statistical uncertainties) over the multiplicity bins used in Refs. [4,5] since our present resultsaresummedoverallmultiplicity.Fig.6showsthe compar-ison betweenthepresentresultsfor R and
λ
andmeasurements fromtheidentical-kaon femtoscopyin7 TeVpp collisions.The Rvalues are seen to agree between the present analysis and the identical kaon analyses within the uncertainties. The
λ
param-eters shown in Fig. 6 are each divided by their respective pair purities. Going fromthe lowest to the highestkT points, for the neutral-kaon pairs thepuritiesare 0.88and0.84 [4], andfortheFig. 5. R andλparametersextractedinthepresentanalysisfromK0
SK±femtoscopy
averagedoverK0
SK+andK0SK−,alongwithacomparisonwithK0SK±resultsfrom
ALICE2.76TeVPb–Pbcollisionsfor0–10%centrality [2].Thequadraticsumofthe statisticalandsystematicuncertaintiesisplottedfor allresultsasboxesandthe statisticaluncertaintiesaregivenaslines.Theλparametershavebeendividedby theirrespectivepairpuritiestofacilitatetheircomparison.
Fig. 6. R andpurity-normalizedλparametersextractedinthepresentanalysisfrom K0
SK± femtoscopyaveraged overK0SK+ and K0SK−,along with comparisonswith
identicalkaonresultsfromALICE7TeVppcollisionsaveragedoverevent multiplic-ity.Thequadraticsumofthestatisticalandsystematicuncertaintiesisplottedfor allresultsasboxesandthestatisticaluncertaintiesaregivenaslines.Alsoplotted asabluedashedlineisthesimpleaverageoftheidentical-kaonpurity-normalized λparameters.
charge-kaon pairs the purities are 0.84, 0.61, 0.79 and 1.0 [5], respectively. The purity-normalized
λ
parameters for the identi-cal kaons are seen to scatter in a wide range betweenvalues of0.3–0.7,whereas the K0SK± valuesare seento liein thenarrower rangeof0.25–0.30.
Inordertohelpto clarifythecomparisonbetweenthe purity-normalized
λ
valuesfromK0SK±andtheidentical-kaonresults,the simpleaverageovertheidenticalkaonpurity-normalizedλ
param-etersisplottedasa bluedashedlineinFig.6.As seen,theK0SK± valuestendtobesmallerthantheaverageoftheidenticalkaons, as was more significantly the case for the comparison with the purity-normalizedλ
valuesfromPb–PbseeninFig.5,howeverthe large scatterofthe identicalkaonsmakes itdifficult todrawany strongconclusionsfromthiscomparison.4.5. Implicationsfromthepresentresultsforthea0tobeatetraquark state
The K0SK± FSI is described well by assuming it is due to the
a0 resonancefor both pp and Pb–Pb collisions, asseen in Fig. 3
of the present work and in Fig. 2 of Ref. [2]. The R parameters
extracted fromthismethod are also seen toagree within uncer-tainties withthe identical-kaon measurements for each of these collisionsystems.ForPb–Pbcollisions,itwasfoundthatthe
λ
pa-rameters extractedfromK0SK± alsoagree withthe corresponding identical-kaon measurements for Pb–Pb collisions indicating that the FSIbetweenthe kaonsgoes solelythrough thea0 resonance.Thepresentppcollisionresultsfor
λ
,whicharesignificantlylower than the K0SK± values from Pb–Pb collisions seen in Fig. 5 and whichtendtobelowerthanthecorrespondingidentical-kaon val-ues in pp collisions seen in Fig. 6, imply that the FSI for these collisions does not go solely through the a0 resonance, i.e. non-resonant elastic channels and/or free-streaming are also present. From the arguments given in the Introduction, this is the geo-metric effectthat wouldbe expectedin the caseof atetraquarka0 since competing annihilation channels could open up in the
smallersystemandcompetewiththeFSIthroughthea0,whereas foradiquarka0 theFSIshouldstill gosolelythroughthea0.The pp collisionresultsare thuscompatiblewiththeconclusionfrom thePb–Pbcollisionmeasurement [2] thatfavorstheinterpretation ofthea0 resonancetobeatetraquarkstate.
5. Summary
In summary, femtoscopic correlations with the particle pair combinationsK0SK± arestudiedinppcollisionsat
√
s=
7 TeVfor the first time by the LHC ALICE experiment. Correlations in the K0SK±pairsareproducedbyfinal-stateinteractionswhichproceed through the a0 resonance. It is found that the a0 final-state in-teraction describes the shape of the measured K0SK± correlation
functionswell.Theextractedradiusand
λ
parametersforK0 SK−arefound tobe equalwithin the experimentaluncertainties to those for K0SK+. Results of the presentstudy are compared with those from identical-kaon femtoscopic studies also performed withpp collisions at
√
s=
7 TeVby ALICEandwitharecent ALICEK0SK± measurementinPb–Pbcollisionsat√
sNN=
2.
76 TeV.These com-parisonssuggest thatnon-resonant elasticscatteringchannelsare presentinppcollisions,unlikeinPb–Pbcollisions.Itisour conclu-sionthatthepresentresults,incombinationwiththeALICEPb–Pb collision measurements,favortheinterpretationofthea0 tobe atetraquarkstate.
Acknowledgements
The ALICECollaboration would like to thank all its engineers andtechniciansfortheirinvaluablecontributionstothe construc-tionoftheexperimentandtheCERNacceleratorteamsforthe out-standingperformanceoftheLHCcomplex.TheALICECollaboration
gratefully acknowledges the resources and support provided by allGrid centresandthe Worldwide LHCComputing Grid(WLCG) collaboration. The ALICE Collaboration acknowledges the follow-ingfundingagenciesfortheirsupportinbuildingandrunningthe ALICEdetector:A.I. AlikhanyanNationalScienceLaboratory (Yere-vanPhysicsInstitute)Foundation (ANSL),State Committeeof Sci-enceandWorldFederationofScientists (WFS),Armenia; Austrian AcademyofSciencesandNationalstiftungfürForschung, Technolo-gie und Entwicklung, Austria; Ministry of Communications and High Technologies, National Nuclear Research Center, Azerbaijan; Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq), Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Fi-nanciadoradeEstudoseProjetos(Finep)andFundaçãodeAmparo àPesquisadoEstadodeSãoPaulo(FAPESP),Brazil;Ministryof Sci-ence&TechnologyofChina(MSTC),NationalNaturalScience Foun-dationofChina(NSFC)andMinistryofEducationofChina(MOEC), China;MinistryofScienceandEducation,Croatia;Centrode Apli-cacionesTecnológicasyDesarrolloNuclear(CEADEN),Cubaenergía, Cuba;MinistryofEducation,YouthandSportsoftheCzech Repub-lic,CzechRepublic;The DanishCouncil forIndependentResearch NaturalSciences,theCarlsbergFoundationandDanishNational Re-search Foundation (DNRF), Denmark;Helsinki Institute ofPhysics (HIP),Finland;Commissariatàl’EnergieAtomique(CEA)and Insti-tut Nationalde Physique Nucléaire etde Physique des Particules (IN2P3)andCentre National de laRecherche Scientifique (CNRS), France; Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie (BMBF) and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schw-erionenforschung GmbH, Germany; General Secretariat for Re-search and Technology, Ministry of Education, Research and Re-ligions, Greece; National Research, Development and Innovation Office,Hungary;DepartmentofAtomicEnergy,Governmentof In-dia (DAE),DepartmentofScience andTechnology,Governmentof India (DST), University Grants Commission, Government of India (UGC)andCouncil ofScientificandIndustrialResearch(CSIR), In-dia; Indonesian Institute of Sciences, Indonesia; Centro Fermi – MuseoStoricodellaFisica e CentroStudie RicercheEnricoFermi andIstitutoNazionalediFisicaNucleare(INFN),Italy;Institutefor InnovativeScience andTechnology, Nagasaki Institute of Applied Science (IIST), Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) KAKENHIandJapanese MinistryofEducation,Culture,Sports, Sci-enceandTechnology (MEXT), Japan;Consejo Nacionalde Ciencia (CONACYT) yTecnología, through Fondode Cooperación Interna-cionalenCiencia yTecnología(FONCICYT)and DirecciónGeneral deAsuntosdelPersonalAcademico(DGAPA),Mexico;Nederlandse OrganisatievoorWetenschappelijkOnderzoek(NWO),Netherlands; TheResearchCouncilofNorway,Norway;CommissiononScience andTechnology forSustainableDevelopment inthe South (COM-SATS),Pakistan;PontificiaUniversidadCatólicadelPerú,Peru; Min-istryofScienceandHigherEducationandNationalScienceCentre, Poland;KoreaInstituteofScienceandTechnologyInformationand NationalResearch Foundation of Korea (NRF), Republic ofKorea; MinistryofEducation andScientific Research, Institute ofAtomic PhysicsandRomanianNationalAgencyforScience,Technologyand Innovation, Romania; Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR), Ministryof Education andScience ofthe Russian Federation and NationalResearch Centre Kurchatov Institute, Russia; Ministry of Education,Science,ResearchandSportoftheSlovakRepublic, Slo-vakia;NationalResearchFoundationofSouthAfrica,SouthAfrica; SwedishResearchCouncil(VR)andKnut&AliceWallenberg Foun-dation (KAW), Sweden; European Organization for Nuclear
Re-search,Switzerland;NationalScienceandTechnologyDevelopment Agency(NSDTA),SuranareeUniversityofTechnology(SUT)and Of-fice of the Higher Education Commission under NRU project of Thailand,Thailand;TurkishAtomicEnergyAgency(TAEK),Turkey; National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Ukraine; Science and TechnologyFacilitiesCouncil(STFC),UnitedKingdom;National Sci-enceFoundationoftheUnitedStatesofAmerica(NSF)andUnited StatesDepartmentof Energy, OfficeofNuclear Physics (DOE NP), UnitedStatesofAmerica.
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