The production of $\Upsilon$ mesons in Pb-Pb collisions at a centre-of-mass energy per nucleon pair $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}}$ = 5 TeV is measured with the muon spectrometer of the ALICE detector at the LHC. The yields as well as the nuclear modification factors are determined in the forward rapidity region $2.5<y<4.0$, as a function of rapidity, transverse momentum and collision centrality. The results show that the production of the $\Upsilon$(1S) meson is suppressed by a factor of about three with respect to the production in proton-proton collisions. For the first time, a significant signal for the $\Upsilon$(2S) meson is observed at forward rapidity, indicating a suppression stronger by about a factor 2-3 with respect to the ground state. The measurements are compared with transport, hydrodynamic, comover and statistical hadronisation model calculations.
Rapidity-differential yield of $\Upsilon(1\mathrm{S}) \rightarrow \mu^{+}\mu^{-}$ divided by the average nuclear overlap function $\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ for the 0–90% centrality interval ($\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ = 6.28 $\pm$ 0.06 mb$^{-1}$).
Rapidity-differential yield of $\Upsilon(2\mathrm{S}) \rightarrow \mu^{+}\mu^{-}$ divided by the average nuclear overlap function $\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ for the 0–90% centrality interval ($\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ = 6.28 $\pm$ 0.06 mb$^{-1}$).
$p_{\mathrm{T}}$-differential yield of $\Upsilon(1\mathrm{S}) \rightarrow \mu^{+}\mu^{-}$ divided by the average nuclear overlap function $\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ for the 0–90% centrality interval ($\langle T_{\mathrm{AA}} \rangle$ = 6.28 $\pm$ 0.06 mb$^{-1}$).
The differential invariant yield as a function of transverse momentum ($p_\mathrm{T}$) of electrons from semileptonic heavy-flavour hadron decays was measured at midrapidity in central (0-10%), semi-central (30-50%) and peripheral (60-80%) lead-lead (Pb-Pb) collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\mathrm{NN}}}=5.02\text{ TeV}$ in the $p_{\mathrm{T}}$ intervals 0.5-26 GeV/$c$ (0-10% and 30-50%) and 0.5-10 GeV/$c$ (60-80%). The production cross section in proton-proton (pp) collisions at $\sqrt{s}=5.02$ TeV was measured as well in $0.5<p_\mathrm{T}<10$ GeV/$c$ and it lies close to the upper band of perturbative QCD calculation uncertainties up to $p_\mathrm{T}=5$ GeV/$c$ and close to the mean value for larger $p_\mathrm{T}$. The modification of the electron yield with respect to what is expected for an incoherent superposition of nucleon-nucleon collisions is evaluated by measuring the nuclear modification factor $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$. The measurement of the $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ in different centrality classes allows in-medium energy loss of charm and beauty quarks to be investigated. The $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ shows a suppression with respect to unity at intermediate $p_\mathrm{T}$, which increases while moving towards more central collisions. Moreover, the measured $R_{\mathrm{AA}}$ is sensitive to the modification of the parton distribution functions (PDF) in nuclei, like nuclear shadowing, which causes a suppression of the heavy-quark production at low $p_\mathrm{T}$ in heavy-ion collisions at LHC.
HFe cross section in pp
HFe cross section in Pb-Pb, 0-10 centrality
HFe cross section in Pb-Pb, 30-50 centrality
Neutral pion and $\eta$ meson production in the transverse momentum range 1 < $p_{T}$ < 20 GeV/$c$ have been measured at mid-rapidity by the ALICE experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in central and semi-central Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 2.76 TeV. These results were obtained using the photon conversion method as well as the PHOS and EMCal detectors. The results extend the upper $p_{T}$ reach of the previous ALICE $\pi^{0}$ measurements from 12 GeV/$c$ to 20 GeV/$c$ and present the first measurement of $\eta$ meson production in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC. The $\eta/\pi^{0}$ ratio is similar for the two centralities and reaches at high $p_{T}$ a plateau value of 0.457 $\pm$ 0.013$^{stat}$ $\pm$ 0.018$^{syst}$. A suppression of similar magnitude for $\pi^{0}$ and $\eta$ meson production is observed in Pb-Pb collisions with respect to their production in pp collisions scaled by the number of binary nucleon-nucleon collisions. We discuss the results in terms of NLO pQCD predictions and hydrodynamic models. The measurements show a stronger suppression with respect to what was observed at lower center-of-mass energies in the $p_{T}$ range 6 < $p_{T}$ < 10 GeV/$c$. At $p_{T}$ < 3 GeV/$c$, hadronization models describe the $\pi^{0}$ results while for the $\eta$ some tension is observed.
Invariant yields of the $\pi^{0}$ meson in the centrality class 0-10% in Pb-Pb collisions at sqrt{s_NN} = 2.76 TeV at mid-rapidity.
Invariant yields of the $\pi^{0}$ meson in the centrality class 20-50% in Pb-Pb collisions at sqrt{s_NN} = 2.76 TeV at mid-rapidity.
Invariant yields of the $\eta$ meson in the centrality class 0-10% in Pb-Pb collisions at sqrt{s_NN} = 2.76 TeV at mid-rapidity.
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