A measurement ofB meson production and lifetime usingDl − events inZ 0 decays

A study of B meson decays into D l- X final states is presented. In these events, neutral and charged D mesons originate predominantly from B+ and B0 decays, respectively. The dilution of this correlation due to D** production has been taken into account. From 263700 hadronic Z0 decays collected in 1991 with the DELPHI detector at the LEP collider, 92 D0 --> K- pi+, 35 D+ --> K- pi+ pi+ and 61 D*+ --> D0 pi+ followed by D0 --> K- pi+ or D0 --> K- pi+ pi+ pi-, are found with an associated lepton of the same charge as the kaon. From the D0 l- and D*+ l-, the probability f(d) that a b quark hadronizes into a B- (or B0BAR),meson is found to be 0.44 +/-0.08 +/-0.09, corresponding to a total (B(s) + LAMBDA(b)) hadronization fraction of 0.12(-0.12)+0.24 .By reconstructing the energy of each B meson, the b quark fragmentation is directly measured for the first time. The mean value of the B meson energy fraction is: [X(E)(B)] = 0.695+/-0.015(stat.)+/-0.029(syst.)Reconstructing D-lepton vertices, the following B life-times are measured: tau(B) = 1.27(-0.18)+0.22(stat.)+/-0.15(syst.) ps, where bBAR --> D0 l- X, tau(B) = 1.18(-0.27)+0.39(stat.)+/-0.15(syst.) ps, where BBAR --> D+ l- X, T(B) = 1.19(-0.19)+0.25(stat.)+/-0.15(syst.) ps where BBAR --> D*+ l- X, and an average tau(B) = 1.23(-0.13)+0.14(stat.)+/-0.15(syst.) ps is found. Allowing for decays into D** l- vBAR, the B+ and B0 lifetimes are: tau(B+)= 1.30(0.29)+0.33(stat.)+/-0.15(syst. exp.) +/-0.05(syst. D**) ps, tau(B0)= 1.17(-0.23)+0.29(stat.)+/-0.15(syst. exp.) +/-0.05 (syst. D**) ps, tau(B+)/tau(B0) = 1.11(0.39)+0.51(stat.)+/-0.05(syst. exp.) +/-0.10(syst. D**) ps.