Collisional dissociation of heavy mesons in dense QCD matter

In the framework of the reaction operator approach we calculate and resum the multiple elastic scattering of a fast q (q) over bar system traversing dense nuclear matter. We derive the collisional broadening of the meson's transverse momentum and the distortion of its intrinsic light cone wave function. The medium-induced dissociation probability of heavy mesons is shown to be sensitive to the opacity of the quark-gluon plasma and the time dependence of its formation and evolution. We solve the system of coupled rate equations that describe the competition between the fragmentation of c- and b-quarks and the QGP-induced dissociation of the D- and B-mesons to evaluate the quenching of heavy hadrons in nucleus-nucleus collisions. In contrast to previous results on heavy quark modification, this approach predicts suppression of B-mesons comparable to that of D-mesons at transverse momenta as low as p(T) similar to 10 GeV. It allows for an improved description of the large attenuation of non-photonic electrons in central Au + Au reactions at RHIC. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.