Scattering of twisted relativistic electrons by atoms

The Mott scattering of high-energetic twisted electrons by atoms is investigated within the framework of the first Born approximation and Dirac's relativistic equation. Special emphasis is placed on the angular distribution and longitudinal polarization of the scattered electrons. In order to evaluate these angular and polarization properties we consider two experimental setups in which the twisted electron beam collides with either a single well-localized atom or macroscopic atomic target. Detailed relativistic calculations have been performed for both setups and for the electrons with kinetic energy from 10 keV to 1000 keV. The results of these calculations indicate that the emission pattern and polarization of outgoing electrons differ significantly from the scattering of plane-wave electrons and can be very sensitive to the parameters of the incident twisted beam. In particular, it is shown that the angular- and polarization-sensitive Mott measurements may reveal valuable information about, both the transverse and longitudinal components of the linear momentum and the projection of the total angular momentum of twisted electron states. Thus, the Mott scattering emerges as a diagnostic tool for the relativistic vortex beams.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figure

Production of relativistic positronium in collisions of photons and electrons with nuclei and atoms

We consider the production of ultrarelativistic positronium (Ps) in $\gamma A \to Ps + A$ and $e A \to Ps + e A$ processes where $A$ is an atom or a nucleus with charge $Ze$. For the photoproduction of para- and ortho-Ps and the electroproduction of para-Ps we obtain the most complete description compared with previous works. It includes high order $Z \alpha$ corrections and polarization effects. The accuracy of the obtained cross sections is determined by omitted terms of the order of the inverse Ps Lorentz factor squared. The studied high order multi-photon electroproduction of ortho-Ps dominates for the collision of electrons with heavy atoms over the bremsstrahlung production from the electron via a virtual photon proposed by Holvik and Olsen. Our results complete and correct the studies of those authors.Comment: 19 pages, 9 figures, RevTex; v2: minor corrections for the accuracy of the results, a discussion of the literature added in a footnote, one additional reference; v3: diagram of Fig.2 correcte

A new signature for gauge mediated supersymmetry breaking

In theories with gauge mediated supersymmetry breaking, the scalar tau, (${\tilde \tau_1}$) is the lightest superpartner for a large range of the parameter space. At the large electron positron collider (LEP 2) this scenario can give rise to events with four $\tau$ leptons and large missing energy. Two of the $\tau$'s ( coming from the decays of ${\tilde \tau_1}$'s ) will have large energy and transverse momentum, and can have similar sign electrical charges. Such events are very different from the usual photonic events that have been widely studied, and could be a very distinct signal for the discovery of supersymmetry.Comment: 15 pages(Latex), 2 PS Figures (epsf.tex), minor modification in the text, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let

Production of para-- and orthopositronium at relativistic heavy ion colliders

We consider the ortho-- and parapositronium production in the process $AA \to AA+$ Ps where A is a nucleus with the charge number Z. The inclusive cross section and the energy distribution of the relativistic Ps are calculated which are of primary interest from the experimental point of view. The accuracy of the corresponding cross sections is given by omitting terms $\sim (Z\alpha )^2/L^2$ for the para--Ps and $\sim (Z\alpha)^2/L$ for the ortho--Ps production where $L=\ln{\gamma^2} \approx 9$ and 16 for the RHIC and the LHC. Within this accuracy the multiphoton (Coulomb) corrections are taken into account. We show that the RHIC and the LHC will be Ps factories with a productions rate of about $10^5 \div 10^8$ relativistic Ps per day. The fraction of the ortho--Ps is expected to be of the same order as that of the para--Ps for Au--Au and Pb--Pb collisions.Comment: 22 pages, 5 figures, RevTeX, misprint correcte

Vector exchanges in production of light meson pairs and elementary atoms

The production of pseudoscalar and scalar mesons pairs and bound states (positronium or pionium atoms) in high energy $\gamma\gamma$ collisions at high energies provided by photon or vector meson exchanges are considered. The vector exchanges lead to nondecreasing with energy cross section of binary process $\gamma+\gamma\to h_a+h_b$ with $h_a, h_b$ states in the fragmentation regions of initial particles. The production of light mesons pairs $\pi\pi, \eta\eta, \eta'\eta', \sigma\sigma$ as well as a pairs of positronium $Ps$ and pionium $A_\pi$ atoms in peripheral kinematics are discussed. Unlike the photon exchange the vector meson exchange needs a reggeization, leading to fall with energy. Nevertheless due to peripheral kinematics out of very forward production angles the vector meson exchanges dominated. The proposed approach allows to express the matrix elements of the considered processes through impact factors, which can be calculated in perturbation models like Chiral Perturbation Theory (ChPT) or Nambu-Jona-Lasinio (NJL) model or determined from $\gamma\gamma$ sub-processes or vector mesons radiative decay widths. We obtain the cross sections for pionium atom production in collisions of high energy pions and electrons with protons. The possibility to measure these processes in experiment are discussed.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figure

Direct Measurements of A_b and A_c using Vertex/Kaon Charge Tags at SLD

Exploiting the manipulation of the SLC electron-beam polarization, we present precise direct measurements of the parity violation parameters A_c and A_b in the Z boson - c quark and Z boson - b quark coupling. Quark/antiquark discrimination is accomplished via a unique algorithm that takes advantage of the precise SLD CCD vertex detector, employing the net charge of displaced vertices as well as the charge of kaons that emanate from those vertices. From the 1996-98 sample of 400,000 Z decays, produced with an average beam polarization of 73.4%, we find A_c = 0.673 +/- 0.029 (stat.) +/- 0.023 (syst.) and A_b = 0.919 +/- 0.018 (stat.) +/- 0.017 (syst.).Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures, 2 tables, to be submitted to Physical Review Letters; version 2 reflects changes suggested by the refere

Measurement of the branching ratios of the Z0 into heavy quarks

We measure the hadronic branching ratios of the Z0 boson into heavy quarks: Rb=Gamma(Z0->bb)/Gamma(Z0->hadrons) and Rc=Gamma(Z0->cc/Gamma(Z0->hadrons) using a multi-tag technique. The measurement was performed using about 400,000 hadronic Z0 events recorded in the SLD experiment at SLAC between 1996 and 1998. The small and stable SLC beam spot and the CCD-based vertex detector were used to reconstruct bottom and charm hadron decay vertices with high efficiency and purity, which enables us to measure most efficiencies from data. We obtain, Rb=0.21604 +- 0.00098(stat.) +- 0.00073(syst.) -+ 0.00012(Rc) and, Rc= 0.1744 +- 0.0031(stat.) +- 0.0020(syst.) -+ 0.0006(Rb)Comment: 37 pages, 8 figures, to be submitted to Phys. Rev. D version 2: changed title to ratios, used common D production fractions for Rb and Rc and corrected Zgamma interference. Identical to PRD submissio

A Search for Jet Handedness in Hadronic Z0Z^0 Decays

We have searched for signatures of polarization in hadronic jets from $Z^0 \to q \bar{q}$ decays using the ``jet handedness'' method. The polar angle asymmetry induced by the high SLC electron-beam polarization was used to separate quark jets from antiquark jets, expected to be left- and right-polarized, respectively. We find no evidence for jet handedness in our global sample or in a sample of light quark jets and we set upper limits at the 95% C.L. of 0.063 and 0.099 respectively on the magnitude of the analyzing power of the method proposed by Efremov {\it et al.}Comment: Revtex, 8 pages, 2 figure

Search for time-dependent B0s - B0s-bar oscillations using a vertex charge dipole technique

We report a search for B0s - B0s-bar oscillations using a sample of 400,000 hadronic Z0 decays collected by the SLD experiment. The analysis takes advantage of the electron beam polarization as well as information from the hemisphere opposite that of the reconstructed B decay to tag the B production flavor. The excellent resolution provided by the pixel CCD vertex detector is exploited to cleanly reconstruct both B and cascade D decay vertices, and tag the B decay flavor from the charge difference between them. We exclude the following values of the B0s - B0s-bar oscillation frequency: Delta m_s < 4.9 ps-1 and 7.9 < Delta m_s < 10.3 ps-1 at the 95% confidence level.Comment: 18 pages, 3 figures, replaced by version accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.D; results differ slightly from first versio

Measurement of the B0-anti-B0-Oscillation Frequency with Inclusive Dilepton Events

The $B^0$-$\bar B^0$ oscillation frequency has been measured with a sample of 23 million \B\bar B pairs collected with the BABAR detector at the PEP-II asymmetric B Factory at SLAC. In this sample, we select events in which both B mesons decay semileptonically and use the charge of the leptons to identify the flavor of each B meson. A simultaneous fit to the decay time difference distributions for opposite- and same-sign dilepton events gives $\Delta m_d = 0.493 \pm 0.012{(stat)}\pm 0.009{(syst)}$ ps$^{-1}$.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, submitted to Physical Review Letter