On dissociation of heavy mesons in a hot quark-gluon plasma

Abstract

We compare two mechanisms for the dissociation of heavy mesons in an infinite quark-gluon plasma: dynamic Debye screening and multiple scattering. Using the uncertainty principle inspired by a Schrodinger-like equation, we find that the criterion a_B\simeq1/\mu\simeq 1/(\alpha_{eff}^{1/2}T) with \alpha_{eff}\equiv\alpha(N_c+{N_f\over2}) is parametrically true both for the dissociation of fast moving heavy mesons with a size a_B due to dynamic Debye screening as well as for mesons at rest in the medium. In contrast, we find that the criterion for the dissociation of heavy mesons due to uncorrelated multiple scattering is parametrically 1/a_B \simeq [\gamma\alpha_{eff}\ln{1/\alpha_{eff}}]^{1/3}T. Therefore, multiple scattering is a more efficient mechanism for the dissociation of heavy mesons in an infinite hot plasma.Comment: 23 pages, 2 figures; minor changes, added references, accepted in Nuclear Physics