The HERA-B Ring Imaging Cherenkov Counter

The HERA-B RICH uses a radiation path length of 2.8 m in C_4F_10 gas and a large 24 square meters spherical mirror for imaging Cherenkov rings. The photon detector consists of 2240 Hamamatsu multi-anode photomultipliers with about 27000 channels. A 2:1 reducing two-lens telescope in front of each PMT increases the sensitive area at the expense of increased pixel size, resulting in a contribution to the resolution which roughly matches that of dispersion. The counter was completed in January of 1999, and its performance has been steady and reliable over the years it has been in operation. The design performance of the RICH was fully reached: the average number of detected photons in the RICH for a beta=1 particle was found to be 33 with a single hit resolution of 0.7 mrad and 1 mrad in the fine and coarse granularity regions, respectively.Comment: 29 pages, 23 figure

Observation of B+ to Lambda Lambdabar K+

We report the first observation of the charmless hyperonic B decay, B^+ --> Lambda Lambdabar K^+, using a 140 fb^-1 data sample recorded at the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB e^+e^- collider. The measured branching fraction is B(B^+ --> Lambda Lambdabar K^+) = 2.91 ^{+0.90}_{-0.70} +/- 0.38 *10^-6 . We also perform a search for the related decay mode B^+ --> Lambda Lambdabar pi^+, but do not find a significant signal. We set a 90% confidence-level upper limit of B(B^+ --> Lambda Lambdabar pi^+) < 2.8 * 10^-6.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. Let

Observation of B+->Lambda_c+Lambda_c-K+ and B0->Lambda_c+Lambda_c^-K0 decays

We report first measurements of the doubly charmed baryonic B decays B->Lambda_c+Lambda_c-K. The B+->Lambda_c+Lambda_c-K+ decay is observed with a branching fraction of (6.5+1.0-0.9+-1.1+-3.4)x10^{-4} and a statistical significance of 15.4sigma. The B0->Lambda_c+Lambda_c-K0 decay is observed with a branching fraction of (7.9+2.9-2.3+-1.2+-4.2)x10^{-4} and a statistical significance of 6.6sigma. The branching fraction errors are statistical, systematic, and the error resulting from the uncertainty of Lambda_c+->pK-pi+ decay branching fraction. The analysis is based on 357fb-1 of data accumulated at the Y(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric e+e- collider.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figure

Search for tau -> e gamma decay at Belle

We have searched for the lepton-flavor-violating decay tau -> e gamma using a data sample of 86.7/fb collected with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric e^+ e^- collider. No evidence for a signal is obtained, and we set an upper limit for the branching fraction Br(tau -> e gamma) < 3.9 x 10^-7 at the 90% C.L.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures, ReVTeX4, eps

Measurement of Azimuthal Asymmetries in Inclusive Production of Hadron Pairs in e+e- Annihilation at Belle

The Collins effect connects transverse quark spin with a measurable azimuthal dependence in the yield of hadronic fragments around the quark's momentum vector. Using two different reconstruction methods we observe statistically significant azimuthal asymmetries for charged pion pairs in e+e- annihilation at a center-of-mass energy of 10.52 GeV, which can be attributed to a transverse polarization of the primordial quarks. The measurement was performed using a sample of 79 million hadronic events collected with the Belle detector.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure

Search for the Lepton-Flavor-Violating Decay τ−→μ−η\tau^- \to \mu^- \eta at Belle

We have searched for the Lepton Flavor Violating decay $\tau^- \to \mu^- \eta$ using a data sample of 84.3 fb$^{-1}$ accumulated with the Belle detector at KEK. The $\eta$-meson was detected through the decay modes: $\eta \to \gamma\gamma$ and $\pi^+\pi^-\pi^0$. No signal candidates are found, and we obtain an upper limit for the branching fraction ${\cal B}(\tau^- \to \mu^- \eta)<3.4\times 10^{-7}$ at the 90% confidence level.Comment: Submitted to Phys.Rev.Let

Measurement of the branching fractions for B- --> D(*)+ pi- l- nu-bar and B0bar --> D(*)0 pi+ l- nu-bar

We report on a measurement of the branching fractions for B- --> D(*)+ pi- l- nu-bar and B0bar --> D(*)0 pi+ l- nu-bar with 275 million BBbar events collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at KEKB. Events are tagged by fully reconstructing one of the B mesons in hadronic modes. We obtain Br(B- --> D+ pi- l- nu-bar) = (0.54 +/- 0.07(stat) +/- 0.07(syst) +/- 0.06(BR)) x 10^-2, Br(B- --> D*+ pi- l- nu-bar) = (0.67 +/- 0.11(stat) +/- 0.09(syst) +/- 0.03(BR)) x 10^-2, Br(B0bar --> D0 pi+ l- nu-bar) = (0.33 +/- 0.06(stat) +/- 0.06(syst) +/- 0.03(BR)) x 10^-2, Br(B0bar --> D*0 pi+ l- nu-bar) = (0.65 +/- 0.12(stat) +/- 0.08(syst) +/- 0.05(BR)) x 10^-2, where the third error comes from the error on Bbar --> D(*) l- nu-bar decays. Contributions from B0bar --> D*+ l- nu-bar decays are excluded in the measurement of B0bar --> D0 pi+ l- nu-bar.Comment: 6 pages, 10 figures, submitted to Physical Review D (Rapid Communication), the Lepton-Photon 2005 Conference (Uppsala, Sweden) and the HEP2005 Europhysics Conference (Lisboa, Portugal

Observation of a narrow charmonium-like state in exclusive B+ -> K+ pi+pi- J/psi decays

We report the observation of a narrow charmonium-like state produced in the exclusive decay process B+ -> K+ pi+pi- J/psi. This state, which decays into pi+pi- J/psi, has a mass of 3872.0+-0.6(stat)+-0.5(syst) MeV, a value that is very near the M_D + M_D* mass threshold. The results are based on an analysis of 152M B-Bbar events collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance in the Belle detector at the KEKB collider. The statistical significance of the signal is in excess of 10 sigma.Comment: 10 pages 4 figures, submitted to Physical Review Letter

Measurement of the ratio B(D0->pi+pi-pi0)/B(D0->K-pi+pi0) and the time-integrated CP asymmetry in D0->pi+pi-pi0

We report a high-statistics measurement of the relative branching fraction B(D0->pi+pi-pi0)/B(D0->K-pi+pi0) using a 532 fb^{-1} data sample collected with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy e+e- collider. The measured value of the relative branching fraction is B(D0->pi+pi-pi0)/B(D0->K-pi+pi0) = (10.12 +/- 0.04(stat) +/- 0.18(syst))x10^{-2} which has an accuracy comparable to the world average. We also present a measurement of the time-integrated CP asymmetry in D0->pi+pi-pi0 decay. The result, A_{CP} = (0.43 +/- 1.30)%, shows no significant CP violation.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figures, submitted to Physics Letters

Measurement of the wrong-sign decays D0 -> K+ pi- pi0 and D0 -> K+ pi- pi+ pi-, and search for CP violation

Using 281 fb^-1 of data from the Belle experiment recorded at or near the Upsilon(4S) resonance, we have measured the rates of the ``wrong-sign'' decays D0 -> K+ pi- pi0 and D0 -> K+ pi- pi+ pi- relative to those of the Cabibbo-favored decays D0 -> K- pi+ pi0 and D0 -> K- pi+ pi+ pi-. These wrong-sign decays proceed via a doubly Cabibbo-suppressed amplitude or via D0-D0bar mixing; the latter has not yet been observed. We obtain R_WS(Kpipi0)=[0.229 +/-0.017(stat.) +0.013-0.009(sys.)]% and R_WS(K3pi)=[0.320 +/-0.019(stat.) +0.018-0.013(sys.)]%. The CP asymmetries are measured to be -0.006 +/- 0.053 and -0.018 +/- 0.044 for the K+ pi- pi0 and K+ pi- pi+ pi- final states, respectively.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures, submitted to PRL, Lepton-Photon 2005 Conference in Uppsala, Sweden and HEP2005 Europhysics Conference in Lisboa, Portuga