Observation of a narrow baryon resonance decaying to pK0S in proton-nucleus interactions at 70 GeV/c with the SVD-2 setup

Data from the SVD-2 experiment that were obtained at the IHEP accelerator in 70-GeV/c proton-nucleus interactions are analyzed with the aim of searches for an exotic Θ+ baryon that decays through the pK S 0 channel. The reaction pN → pK S 0 + X characterized by a bounded multiplicity of charged secondaries is used for this analysis. A resonance of mass M = 1526 ± 3(stat.) ± 3(syst.) MeV/c 2 and width Γ < 24 MeV/c 2 is observed in the invariant-mass spectrum of the pK S 0 system at a statistical significance of 5.6σ. The mass and the width of this resonance correspond to the recently found positive-strangeness Θ+ baryon, which was predicted to be an exotic baryon consisting of five quarks (pentaquark), $$uudd\bar s$$ . The total cross section for the production of a Θ+ baryon in pA interactions is estimated at a value within the range 30–120 μb for x F ≥ 0. An analysis of the A dependence of the cross section for Θ+-baryon production does not reveal a significant deviation from the A dependence for inelastic events (∼A 0.7).