Study of muon-tagged $D_{s1}(2460)^+$ and $D_{s1}(2536)^+$ decays to the $D_s^{+}\pi^+\pi^-$ final state

Abstract

Decays of the pseudovector $D_{s1}(2460)^+$ and $D_{s1}(2536)^+$ mesons to the three-body $D_{s}^+\pi^+\pi^-$ final state are studied. The data sample is based on decays of beauty hadrons into $D_{s1}^+$ states accompanied by a muon from the $b$-hadron decay chain collected by the LHCb detector during 2016--2018, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5.4 fb${}^{-1}$. The \mbox{$D_{s1}(2536)^+\to D_s^+\pi^+\pi^-$} branching fraction is measured for the first time, with the $D_{s1}(2536)^+\to D^+K^+\pi^-$ decay used as a reference. A simultaneous amplitude analysis of the $D_{s1}(2460)^+$ and $D_{s1}(2536)^+\to D_s^+\pi^+\pi^-$ decays is performed. The Dalitz-plot distributions of the two decays are found to be significantly different, suggesting differences in the internal structure of the two states, with evidence of exotic contributions to the $D_{s}^+\pi^{\pm}$ channel with the pole below the $DK$ threshold. Measurements of the masses of the $D_{s1}(2460)^+$ and $D_{s1}(2536)^+$ states are performed, and an upper limit on the $D_{s1}(2460)^+$ width is set.