On the mechanism of open-flavor strong decays.

Open-flavor strong decays are mediated by qq̄ pair production, which is known to occur dominantly with P0 quantum numbers. The relation of the phenomenological P0 model of these decays to “microscopic” QCD decay mechanisms has never been clearly established. In this paper we investigate qq̄ meson decay amplitudes assuming pair production from the scalar confining interaction (sKs) and from one gluon exchange (OGE). sKs pair production predicts decay amplitudes of approximately the correct magnitude and D/S amplitude ratios in b1 → ωπ and a1 → ρπ which are close to experiment. The OGE decay amplitude is found to be subdominant in most cases, a notable exception being P0 → S0 + S0. The full sKs + OGE amplitudes differ significantly from P0 model predictions in some channels and can be distinguished experimentally, for example through an accurate comparison of the D/S amplitude ratios in b1 → ωπ and a1 → ρπ. †Dedicated to Atsje Barnes, 1 Aug 1993 13 Jan 1996. ∗Current address: Hewlett-Packard Corporation, SIT-UNIX Team, M.S.906-SE3, 20 Perimeter Summit Blvd., Atlanta, GA 30319-1417.