Extracting $p\Lambda$ scattering lengths from heavy ion collisions

The source radii, previously extracted by STAR Collaboration from the $p-\Lambda \oplus \bar{p}-\bar{\Lambda}$ and $\bar{p}-\Lambda \oplus p-\bar{\Lambda}$ correlation functions measured in 10% most central Au+Au collisions at top RHIC energy $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=200$ GeV, differ by a factor of 2. The probable reason for this is the neglect of residual correlation effect in the STAR analysis. In the present paper we analyze baryon correlation functions within Lednicky and Lyuboshitz analytical model, extended to effectively account for the residual correlation contribution. Different analytical approximations for such a contribution are considered. We also use the averaged source radii extracted from the hydrokinetic model (HKM) simulations to fit the experimental data. In contrast to the STAR experimental study, the calculations in HKM show both $p\Lambda$ and $p\bar{\Lambda}$ radii to be quite close, as expected from theoretical considerations. Using the effective Gaussian parametrization of residual correlations we obtain a satisfactory fit to the measured baryon-antibaryon correlation function with the HKM source radius value 3.28 fm. The baryon-antibaryon spin-averaged strong interaction scattering length is also extracted from the fit to the experimental correlation function.