The PHENIX Collaboration

Triangle Singularity as the Origin of the a1(1420)

The COMPASS Collaboration experiment recently discovered a new isovector resonancelike signal with axial-vector quantum numbers, the a 1 ( 1420 ) , decaying to f 0 ( 980 ) π . With a mass too close to and a width smaller than the axial-vector ground state a 1 ( 1260 ) , it was immediately interpreted as a new light exotic meson, similar to the X , Y , Z states in the hidden-charm sector. We show that a resonancelike signal fully matching the experimental data is produced by the decay of the a 1 ( 1260 ) resonance into K * ( → K π ) K ¯ and subsequent rescattering through a triangle singularity into the coupled f 0 ( 980 ) π channel. The amplitude for this process is calculated using a new a…