Multi-pion Bose-Einstein correlation effects on two-pion interferometry

Abstract

A general derivation of the multi-pion Bose-Einstein correlation function for a completely chaotic source is given. Its effects on the pion-multiplicity distribution, pion-spectrum distribution and two-pion interferometry are studied. A generalized multi-pion correlation function for a partially coherent source is also discussed. It is shown that multi-pion Bose-Einstein correlation causes an abundance of pions at low momentum, increases the pions' mean multiplicity and decreases both the apparent radius of the source and the coherent source parameter derived from two-pion interferometry.