Suppression of high transverse momentum D mesons in central Pb-Pb collisions at root s(NN)=2.76 TeV

Abstract

The production of the prompt charm mesons D0, D+, D*+, and their antiparticles, was measured with the ALICE detector in Pb-Pb collisions at the LHC, at a centre-of-mass energy sNN−−−√=2.76TeVsNN=2.76TeV per nucleon-nucleon collision. The pt-differential production yields in the range 2 < pt < 16 GeV/c at central rapidity, |y| < 0.5, were used to calculate the nuclear modification factor RAA with respect to a proton-proton reference obtained from the cross section measured at s√=7TeVs=7TeV and scaled to s√=2.76TeVs=2.76TeV . For the three meson species, RAA shows a suppression by a factor 3–4, for transverse momenta larger than 5 GeV/c in the 20% most central collisions. The suppression is reduced for peripheral collisions.