Measurement of the $B_c^{-}$ meson production fraction and asymmetry in 7 and 13 TeV $pp$ collisions

Abstract

The production fraction of the $B_c^{-}$ meson with respect to the sum of $B^{-}$ and ${\bar{B}}^0$ mesons is measured in both 7 and 13 TeV center-of-mass energy $pp$ collisions produced by the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), using the LHCb detector. The rate, approximately 3.7 per mille, does not change with energy, but shows a transverse momentum dependence. The $B_c^{-}-B_c^{+}$ production asymmetry is also measured, and is consistent with zero within the determined statistical and systematic uncertainties of a few percent.

All figures and tables, along with machine-readable versions and any supplementary material and additional information, are available at https://cern.ch/lhcbproject/Publications/p/LHCb-PAPER-2019-033.html (LHCb public pages). The paper contains 25 pages, 8 figures