Light-Quark Resonances at COMPASS

Abstract

The main goal of the spectroscopy program at COMPASS is to explore the light-meson spectrum in the mass range below about $2\,\text{GeV}/c^2$ using diffractive dissociation reactions. Our flagship channel is the production of three charged pions in the reaction: $π^- + p \to π^-π^-π^+ + p_\text{recoil}$, for which COMPASS has acquired the so far world's largest dataset of roughly $50\,\text{M}$ exclusive events using an $190\,\text{GeV}/c$ $π^-$ beam. In order to extract the parameters of the $π_J$ and $a_J$ resonances that appear in the $π^-π^-π^+$ system, we performed the so far most comprehensive resonance-model fit, using Breit-Wigner parametrizations. This method in combination with the high statistical precision of our data allows us to study ground and excited states. We study the $a_4(2040)$ resonance in the $ρ(770)πG$ and $f_2(1270)πF$ decays. In addition to the ground state resonance $a_1(1260)$, we have found evidence for the $a_1(1640)$. We also study the spectrum of $π_2$ states by simultaneously describing four $J^{PC}=2^{-+}$ waves using three $π_2$ resonances, the $π_2(1670)$, the $π_2(1880)$, and the $π_2(2005)$. Using a novel analysis approach, where the resonance-model fit is performed simultaneously in narrow bins of the squared four-momentum transfer $t'$ between the beam pion and the target proton, allows us to study the $t'$ dependence of resonant and non-resonant components included in our model. We observe that for most of the partial waves, the non-resonant components show a steeper $t'$ spectrum compared to the resonances and that the $t'$ spectrum of most of the resonances becomes shallower with increasing resonance mass. We also study the $t'$ dependence of the relative phases between resonance components. The pattern we observe is consistent with a common production mechanism of these states.