Energy-energy correlators for D⁰-tagged jets in PYTHIA pp collisions

Energy-energy correlators (EEC) offer a novel way to study the structure of jets. Defined as the energy-weighted cross section of particle pairs inside jets, the correlation strength as a function of the pair opening angle allows a distinct separation of the perturbative and non-perturbative regimes. The evolution of parton dynamics in jets to their confinement into hadrons can be studied. We present first studies of the EECs for D⁰-tagged jets in pp collisions at 13 TeV using PYTHIA simulations. By comparing our results with EEC’s in inclusive (gluon-dominated) jets, we can search for modifications in the radiation pattern of jets due to mass effects such as the dead cone. We specifically look at the difference between light- and heavy-quark initiated jets, as well as gluon-initiated jets. We also study the D⁰ jets that decay from a D*, to measure the contribution of the accompanying soft pion and its effect on the energy correlations. These measurements will also serve as a baseline for future studies in heavy-ion collisions, allowing for disentanglement of the dynamics of the dead cone from interactions with the quark-gluon plasma (QGP).