Cross section for bb¯ production via dielectrons in d + Au collisions at √sNN = 200 GeV

Abstract

We report a measurement of e+e− pairs from semileptonic heavy-flavor decays in d + Au collisions at √sNN = 200 GeV. By exploring the mass and transverse-momentum dependence of the yield, the bottom decay contribution can be isolated from charm, and quantified by comparison to PYTHIA and MC@NLO simulations. The resulting bb¯-production cross section is σdAu bb¯ = 1.37 ± 0.28 (stat) ± 0.46 (syst) mb, which is equivalent to a nucleon-nucleon cross section of σ NN bb = 3.4 ± 0.8 (stat) ± 1.1 (syst) μb.