Gluon emission from heavy quarks in dense nuclear matter

Abstract

We study the medium-induced gluon emission process experienced by a hard jet parton propagating through the dense nuclear matter in the framework of deep inelastic scattering off a large nucleus. We work beyond the collinear rescattering expansion and the soft gluon emission limit, and derive a closed formula for the medium-induced single gluon emission spectrum from a heavy or light quark jet interacting with the dense nuclear medium via transverse and longitudinal scatterings. Without performing the collinear rescattering expansion, the medium-induced gluon emission spectrum is controlled by the full distribution of the differential elastic scattering rates between the propagating partons and the medium constituents. We further show that if one utilizes heavy static scattering centers for the traversed nuclear matter and takes the soft gluon emission limit, our result can reduce to the first order in opacity Djordjevic-Gyulassy-Levai-Vitev formula.