Inclusive D^{*+-} Production in p p-bar Collisions with Massive Charm Quarks

Abstract

We calculate the next-to-leading order cross section for the inclusive production of D^{*+-} mesons in p p-bar collisions as a function of the transverse momentum and the rapidity in two approaches using massive or massless charm quarks. For the inclusive cross section, we derive the massless limit from the massive theory. We find that this limit differs from the genuine massless version with MS-bar factorization by finite corrections. By adjusting subtraction terms, we establish a massive theory with MS-bar subtraction which approaches the massless theory with increasing transverse momentum. With these results and including the contributions due to the charm and anti-charm content of the proton and anti-proton, we calculate the inclusive D^{*+-} cross section in p p-bar collisions using realistic evolved non-perturbative fragmentation functions and compare with recent data from the CDF Collaboration at the Fermilab Tevatron at center-of-mass energy root(S) = 1.96 TeV. We find reasonable, though not perfect, agreement with the measured cross sections.