Higher harmonic anisotropic flow measurements of charged particles in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV

We report on the first measurement of the triangular $v_3$, quadrangular $v_4$, and pentagonal $v_5$ charged particle flow in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV measured with the ALICE detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. We show that the triangular flow can be described in terms of the initial spatial anisotropy and its fluctuations, which provides strong constraints on its origin. In the most central events, where the elliptic flow $v_2$ and $v_3$ have similar magnitude, a double peaked structure in the two-particle azimuthal correlations is observed, which is often interpreted as a Mach cone response to fast partons. We show that this structure can be naturally explained from the measured anisotropic flow Fourier coefficients.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/387

Electroweak measurements in electron–positron collisions at w-boson-pair energies at lep

Contains fulltext : 121524.pdf (preprint version ) (Open Access

B flavour tagging using charm decays at the LHCb experiment

An algorithm is described for tagging the flavour content at production of neutral B mesons in the LHCb experiment. The algorithm exploits the correlation of the flavour of a B meson with the charge of a reconstructed secondary charm hadron from the decay of the other b hadron produced in the proton-proton collision. Charm hadron candidates are identified in a number of fully or partially reconstructed Cabibbo-favoured decay modes. The algorithm is calibrated on the self-tagged decay modes B+ -> J/psi K+ and B-0 -> J/psi K*(0) using 3.0fb(-1) of data collected by the LHCb experiment at pp centre-of-mass energies of 7TeV and 8TeV. Its tagging power on these samples of B -> J/psi X decays is (0.30 +/- 0.01 +/- 0.01) %

Measurement of the (B)over-bar(0)-B-0 and (B)over-bars(0)-B-s(0) production asymmetries in pp collisions at root s=7 TeV

The (B) over bar (0)-B-0 and (B) over bar (0)(s)-B-s(0) production asymmetries, A(P)(B-0) and A(P)(B-s(0)), are measured by means of a time-dependent analysis of B-0 -> J/Psi K-*0, B-0 -> D-pi(+) and B-s(0) -> D-s(-)pi(+) decays, using a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb(-1), collected by LHCb in pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV. The measurements are performed as a function of transverse momentum and pseudorapidity of the B-0 and B-s(0) mesons within the LHCb acceptance. The production asymmetries, integrated over p(T) and eta in the range 4 < p(T) < 30 GeV/c and 2.5 < eta < 4.5, are determined to be A(P)(B-0) = (-0.35 +/- 0.76 +/- 0.28)% and A(P)(B-s(0)) = (1.09 +/- 2.61 +/- 0.66)%, where the first uncertainties are statistical and the second systematic. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V

Identification of beauty and charm quark jets at LHCb

Identification of jets originating from beauty and charm quarks is important for measuring Standard Model processes and for searching for new physics. The performance of algorithms developed to select b- and c-quark jets is measured using data recorded by LHCb from proton-proton collisions at root s = 7TeV in 2011 and at root s = 8TeV in 2012. The efficiency for identifying a b (c) jet is about 65%(25%) with a probability for misidentifying a light-parton jet of 0.3% for jets with transverse momentum pT > 20GeV and pseudorapidity 2 : 2 < eta < 4.2. The dependence of the performance on the pT and eta of the jet is also measured

Study of the rare B-s(0) and B-0 decays into the pi(+) pi(-) mu(+) mu(-) final state

A search for the rare decays B-s(0) -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu-and B-0 -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu-is performed in a data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb(-1) collected by the LHCb detector in proton-proton collisions at centre-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV. Decay candidates with pion pairs that have invariant mass in the range 0.5-1.3GeV/c(2) and with muon pairs that do not originate from a resonance are considered. The first observation of the decay B-s(0) -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu- and the first evidence of the decay B-0 -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu-are obtained and the branching fractions, restricted to the dipion-mass range considered, are measured to be B(B-s(0) -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu(-)) =(8.6 +/- 1.5(stat) +/- 0.7(syst) +/- 0.7 (norm)) x 10(-8) and B(B-0 -> pi(+) pi-mu(+) mu(-)) =(2.11 +/- 0.51(stat) +/- 0.15(syst) +/- 0.16(norm)) x10(-8), where the third uncertainty is due to the branching fraction of the decay B-0. -> J/Psi(mu(+) mu(-)) K*(892)(0)(-> K+ pi(-)), used as a normalisation. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V

Measurement of the CP-violating phase beta in B-0 -> J/psi pi(+)pi(-) decays and limits on penguin effects

Time-dependent CP violation is measured in the (B-0) over bar -> J/psi pi(+)pi(-) p-channel for each pi(+)pi(-) resonant final state using data collected with an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb(-1) in pp collisions using the LHCb detector. The final state with the largest rate, J/psi rho(0)(770), is used to measure the CP-violating angle 2 beta(eff) to be (41.7 +/- 9.6(-6.3)(+2.8)).. This result can be used to limit the size of penguin amplitude contributions to CPviolation measurements in, for example, (B-0) over bar -> J/psi pi(+)pi(-) decays. Assuming approximate SU(3) flavour symmetry and neglecting higher order diagrams, the shift in the CP-violating phase phi(s) limited to be within the interval [-1.05 degrees, + 1.18 degrees] at 95% confidence level. Changes to the limit due to SU(3) symmetry breaking effects are also discussed. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V

Observation of the decay (B)over-bar(s)(0) -> psi(2S)K+pi(-)

The decay (B) over bar (0)(s) -> psi(2S)K+pi(-) is observed using a data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb(-1) collected by the LHCb experiment in pp collisions at centre-of-mass energies of 7 and 8 TeV. The branching fraction relative to the B-0 -> psi(2S)K+pi(-) decay mode is measured to be B((B) over bar (0)(s) -> psi(2S)K+pi(-))/B(B-0 -> psi(2S)K+pi(-)) = 5.38 +/- 0.36 (stat) +/- 0.22 (syst) +/- 0.31 (f(s)/f(d)) %, where f(s)/f(d) indicates the uncertainty due to the ratio of probabilities for a b quark to hadronise into a B-s(0) or B-0 meson. Using an amplitude analysis, the fraction of decays proceeding via an intermediate K*(892)(0) meson is measured to be 0.645 +/- 0.049 (stat) +/- 0.049 (syst) and its longitudinal polarisation fraction is 0.524 +/- 0.056 (stat) +/- 0.029 (syst). The relative branching fraction for this component is determined to be B((B) over bar (0)(s) -> psi(2S)K*(892)(0))/B(B-0 -> psi(2S)K*(892)(0)) = 5.58 +/- 0.57 (stat) +/- 0.40 (syst) +/- 0.32 (f(s)/f(d)) %. In addition, the mass splitting between the B-s(0) and B-0 mesons is measured as M(B-s(0)) - M(B-0) = 87.45 +/- 0.44 (stat) +/- 0.09 (syst) MeV/c(2). (C) 2015 CERN for the benefit of the LHCb Collaboration. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY licens

LHCb detector performance

The LHCb detector is a forward spectrometer at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. The experiment is designed for precision measurements of CP violation and rare decays of beauty and charm hadrons. In this paper the performance of the various LHCb sub-detectors and the trigger system are described, using data taken from 2010 to 2012. It is shown that the design criteria of the experiment have been met. The excellent performance of the detector has allowed the LHCb collaboration to publish a wide range of physics results, demonstrating LHCb's unique role, both as a heavy flavour experiment and as a general purpose detector in the forward region