Pairing in multiparticle amplitudes: Inclusive distributions

Abstract

A model for multi-pion production in the central region in high-energy collisions is studied which describes factorizable emission of pion pairs. A mathematical identification between the exclusive cross section for pion emission in our model (with all interference terms) and the configurational probability distribution function for a classical system of interacting molecules in equilibrium is exploited to obtain an expansion for the asymptotic single-particle inclusive distribution, the two-particle inclusive correlation function, and the exponent of s in the total cross section by means of cluster diagrams. An integral equation is exhibited for summing the terms corresponding to the cluster diagrams. A specific model is then considered, which we call “ s-channel pole dominance”. In this model the amplitude is assumed to be large only when the subenergies of pairs of pions are near the mass of a low-lying two-pion resonance, and the transverse momentum of each resonance is small. The dependence of the amplitude on other variables is ignored, so that we effectively have independent emission of two-pion resonances with non-zero width. It is seen that an I = 0 or I = 1 resonance results in a positive two-particle inclusive I = 2 correlation function at small rapidity separations, as s → ∞, and that the correlation function can have an exponential “tail” in rapidity of qualitatively longer range than the resonance. A crude numerical simulation of a broad I = 0 spinless resonance is discussed, and the resulting I = 2 inclusive correlation function is seen to be quite large at small rapidity separations, and to have the same exponential “tail” as the I = 0 correlation function.