Measurement of the branching ratio of pi^0 -> e^+e^- using K_L -> 3 pi^0 decays in flight

dc.creatorKTeV Collaboration
dc.date1999-03-09
dc.date1999-08-04
dc.date.accessioned2026-07-07T10:32:22Z
dc.date.available2026-07-07T10:32:22Z
dc.descriptionThe branching ratio of the rare decay pi^0 -> e^+e^- has been measured in E799-II, a rare kaon decay experiment using the KTeV detector at Fermilab. The pi^0's were produced in fully-reconstructed K_L -> 3 pi^0 decays in flight. We observed 275 candidate pi^0 -> e^+e^- events, with an expected background of 21.4 +- 6.2 events which includes the contribution from Dalitz decays. We measured BR(pi^0 -> e^+e^-, x>0.95) = (6.09 +- 0.40 +- 0.24) times 10^{-8}, where the first error is statistical and the second systematic. This result is the first significant observation of the excess rate for this decay above the unitarity lower bound.
dc.descriptionNew version shortened to PRL length limit. 5 pages, 4 figures. Published in Phys. Rev. Lett
dc.identifierhttps://arxiv.org/abs/hep-ex/9903007
dc.identifierhttp://arxiv.org/abs/hep-ex/9903007
dc.identifierPhys.Rev.Lett.83:922-925,1999
dc.identifierdoi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.83.922
dc.identifier.urihttp://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/178732
dc.subjectHigh Energy Physics - Experiment
dc.titleMeasurement of the branching ratio of pi^0 -> e^+e^- using K_L -> 3 pi^0 decays in flight
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