Production of charm mesons at high transverse momentum in 515 GeV/c {pi}{sup {minus}}-nucleon collisions

We present results on the production of high transverse momentum charm mesons in collisions of 515 GeV/c negative pions with beryllium and copper targets. The experiment recorded a large sample of events containing high transverse momentum (p{sub T}) showers detected in an electromagnetic calorimeter. From these data, a sample of charm mesons has been reconstructed via their decay into the fully charged K{pi}{pi} mode. A measurement of the single inclusive transverse momentum distribution of charged D mesons from 1 to 8 GeV/c is presented. An extrapolation of the measured differential cross section yields an integrated D{sup {plus_minus}} cross section of 11.4{plus_minus}2.7(stat){plus_minus}3.3(syst) {mu}b per nucleon for D{sup {plus_minus}} mesons with x{sub F}{gt}0. The data are compared with expectations based upon next-to-leading-order perturbative QCD, as well as with results from PYTHIA. We also compare our integrated D{sup {plus_minus}} cross section with measurements from other experiments. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}