Antiproton-proton annihilation into four charged pions at rest and in flight

The spin-parity analysis of the data on the ¯pp → 2π+ 2π− annihilation reaction at rest in liquid and in gaseous hydrogen at 3 bar pressure and in flight at p momentum of about 50 MeV/c, collected by the Obelix spectrometer at the LEAR complex of CERN, is presented. The relative branching ratios (a1(1260) → σπ)/(a1(1260) → ρπ) = 0.06 ± 0.05 and (π(1300) → σπ)/(π(1300) → ρπ) = 2.2 ± 0.4 are obtained. It is also shown that the inclusion of the exotic meson π1(1400), JPC= 1−+, mass and width M = 1.384 ± 0.028, Γ = 0.378 ± 0.058 GeV/c2, in its decay to ρπ, improves the fit and some implications of these results are briefly discussed. The relative S and P-wave annihilation percentages in four charged pions at two target densities are obtained.