https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/s10050-022-00785-9
Regular Article - Theoretical Physics
Probing the in-medium 
-broadening by 
+HF angular de-correlations
1
Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Nuclear Science, Institute of Quantum Matter, South China Normal University, 510006, Guangzhou, China
2
Guangdong-Hong Kong Joint Laboratory of Quantum Matter, Southern Nuclear Science Computing Center, South China Normal University, 510006, Guangzhou, China
3
Key Laboratory of Quark and Lepton Physics (MOE) and Institute of Particle Physics, Central China Normal University, 430079, Wuhan, China
4
School of Mathematics and Physics, China University of Geosciences, 430074, Wuhan, China
Received:
24
March
2022
Accepted:
1
July
2022
Published online:
25
July
2022
Angular correlations between vector boson and heavy flavors (HF) are potentially new effective tools to gain insight into the partonic interactions in the quark-gluon plasma (QGP). In this paper, we present the theoretical study of the azimuthal angular de-correlations of 
HF in nucleus-nucleus collisions as a new probe of the in-medium -broadening effect. The initial production of 
HF in p + p is generated by SHERPA which matches the next-to-leading hard processes with parton shower. The in-medium heavy quark evolution is implemented by a Monte Carlo Langevin simulation, which takes into account the collisional and radiative energy loss. We observe considerable suppression at 
and enhancement at 
in D azimuthal angular distribution in 0–10% Pb + Pb collisions at 
TeV compared to the p + p baseline, which indicates evident in-medium -broadening of charm quarks. We also find that the overall modification patterns of D angular distribution are sensitive to the selection cut of D meson 
. Furthermore, by constructing the 2D (
) correlation diagram, it’s possible to display the respective impact of the two aspects of jet quenching, energy loss and -broadening, on the final-state D observable simultaneously. Additionally, we find weaker angular de-correlations of B compared to D which may be helpful to understand the mass hierarchy in heavy-ion collisions. Finally, the nuclear modification of 
distributions in central 0–10% Au + Au collisions at RHIC energy is provided for completeness.
The original online version of this article was revised to correct the order of affiliations.
An erratum to this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/s10050-022-00803-w.
Copyright comment corrected publication 2022
Copyright comment corrected publication 2022
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