James P Vary

J/psi suppression in nucleus-nucleus collisions.

We propose a model for calculating J/psi suppression in high-energy hadron-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions. We factorized the process into a production of the cc- pairs convoluted with a transition probability into the observed J/psi mesons. As the produced cc- pairs exit the nuclear matter, multiple scattering increases the square of the relative momentum between the c and c- such that some pairs are transmuted into open charm states. With only one parameter, the energy gained by the produced cc- pair per unit length in the nuclear medium, our model can fit all observed J/psi suppression data in hadron-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions.