Heavy quark production in heavy-ion collisions

Abstract

The results of the full next-to-leading-order calculation of open charm production cross section, via hard parton scattering, for both hadronic and heavy-ion collisions at RHIC and LHC energies are presented. In addition to the total cross section, the transverse momentum and rapidity distributions are included. An effective K-factor which encapsulates the next-to-leading-order corrections and the nuclear effects is presented. The open charm yield will be measured through the correlated dileptons produced when the charm decays. An important background comes from the decay of bottom quarks. Therefore, the open bottom yield from hard parton scatterings is presented. The first next-to-leading-order calculation of the thermal heavy quark production is presented, as well as the dimuon spectrum from both the thermal and the initial fusion charm and bottom production at RHIC energies.