Angular analysis of the low $K^{+}K^{-}$ invariant mass enhancement in $B^{+}\to K^{+}K^{-}\pi^{+}$ decays

Abstract

We study the decay $B^{+} \to K^+ K^- \pi^+$ and investigate the angular distribution of $K^{+}K^{-}$ pairs with invariant mass below $1.1$ GeV/$c^2$. This region exhibits both a strong enhancement in signal and very large direct $CP$ violation. We construct a coherent sum model for the angular distribution of $S$- and $P$-wave, and report the ratio of their amplitudes, the relative phase and the forward-backward asymmetry. We also report absolute differential branching fractions and direct $CP$ asymmetry for the decay in bins of $M_{K^+K^-}$ and the differential branching fractions in bins of $M_{K^+\pi^-}$. The results are based on a data sample that contains $772\times10^6$ $B \bar{B}$ pairs collected at the $\Upsilon(4S)$ resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy $e^+ e^-$ collider. The measured overall branching fraction and the direct $CP$ asymmetry are $(5.38\pm0.40\pm0.35)\times 10^{-6}$ and $-0.170\pm0.073\pm0.017$, respectively, where the first uncertainties are statistical and the second are systematic.