Measurement of electrons from beauty-hadron decays in 𝑝⁢𝑝 and Pb-Pb collisions at √𝑠_𝑁⁢𝑁 = 5.02 TeV

The production of electrons from beauty-hadron decays was measured at midrapidity in proton-proton (𝑝⁢𝑝) and central Pb-Pb collisions at center-of-mass energy per nucleon-nucleon pair √𝑠_𝑁⁢𝑁 = 5.02 TeV, using the ALICE detector at the LHC. The cross section measured in 𝑝⁢𝑝 collisions in the transverse momentum interval 2 < 𝑝_T < 8GeV/𝑐 was compared with models based on perturbative quantum chromodynamics calculations. The yield in the 10% most central Pb-Pb collisions, measured in the interval 2 < 𝑝_T < 26GeV/𝑐, was used to compute the nuclear modification factor 𝑅_𝐴⁢𝐴, extrapolating the 𝑝⁢𝑝 reference cross section to 𝑝_T larger than 8 GeV/𝑐. The measured 𝑅_𝐴⁢𝐴 shows significant suppression of the yield of electrons from beauty-hadron decays at high 𝑝_T and does not show a significant dependence above 8GeV/𝑐 within uncertainties. The results are described by several theoretical models based on different implementations of the interaction of heavy quarks with a quark-gluon plasma, which predict a smaller energy loss for beauty quarks compared to light and charm quarks.