Heavy baryon production and decay

Abstract

The branching ratio $B({\ensuremath{\Lambda}}_{c}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{\mathrm{pK}}^{\ensuremath{-}}{\ensuremath{\pi}}^{+})$ normalizes the production and decay of charmed and bottom baryons. At present, this crucial branching ratio is extracted dominantly from $\overline{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}\mathrm{baryons}$ analyses. This paper questions several of the underlying assumptions and predicts sizable $\overline{B}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{D}^{(*)}N{N}^{\ensuremath{'}}X$ transitions, which were traditionally neglected. It predicts $B({\ensuremath{\Lambda}}_{c}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{\mathrm{pK}}^{\ensuremath{-}}{\ensuremath{\pi}}^{+})$ to be larger $(0.07\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.02)$ than the world average. Some consequences are briefly mentioned. Several techniques to measure $B({\ensuremath{\Lambda}}_{c}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{\mathrm{pK}}^{\ensuremath{-}}{\ensuremath{\pi}}^{+})$ are outlined with existing or soon available data samples. By equating two recent CLEO results, an appendix obtains ${B(D}^{0}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}{K}^{\ensuremath{-}}{\ensuremath{\pi}}^{+})=0.035\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.002,$ which is somewhat smaller than the current world average.