A measurement of open charm using single muons at forward angles for p+p collisions at center of mass energy 200 GeV

This dissertation presents the measurement of single muons from the semi-leptonic decay of heavy quark mesons (charm and bottom) in √s=200 GeV p+p collisions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Lab. The yield of single muons is measured as a function of transverse momentum and is used to estimate the charm quark production cross section over the measured region.  In addition to theoretical comparisons, this measurement of single muons in p+p serves as a springboard to further heavy quark results in both the RHIC spin and heavy-ion programs.