Measurement of f (c → D* X), f (b → D* X) and Γcc̄/Γhad using D*± mesons

Abstract

The production rates of D*± mesons in charm and bottom events at centre-of-mass energies of about 91 GeV and the partial width of primary cc̄ pairs in hadronic Z0 decays have been measured at LEP using almost 4.4 million hadronic Z0 decays collected with the OPAL detector between 1990 and 1995. Using a combination of several charm quark tagging methods based on fully and partially reconstructed D*± mesons, and a bottom tag based on identified muons and electrons, the hadronisation fractions of charm and bottom quarks into D*± mesons have been found to be f (b → D*+X) = 0.173 ± 0.016 ± 0.012 and f (c → D*+X) = 0.222 ± 0.014 ± 0.014. The fraction of cc̄ events in hadronic Z0 decays, Γcc̄/Γhad ..