Observation of B0bar --> D(*)0 p pbar

Abstract

The B meson decay modes B --> D p pbar and B --> D* p pbar have been studied using 29.4 fb^{-1} of data collected with the Belle detector at KEKB. The B0bar --> D0 p pbar and B0bar --> D*0 p pbar decays have been observed for the first time with branching fractions Br(B0bar --> D0 p pbar) =(1.18\pm 0.15\pm 0.16) 10^{-4} and Br(B0bar --> D*0 p pbar) =(1.20^{+0.33}_{-0.29}\pm 0.21) 10^{-4}. No signal has been found for the B+ --> D+ p pbar and B+ --> D*+ p pbar decay modes, and the corresponding upper limits at 90% C.L. are presented.