We have measured charged-particle production in neutron-nucleus collisions at high energy. Data on positive and negative particles produced in nuclei [ranging in atomic number (A) from beryllium to lead] are presented for essentially the full forward hemisphere of the center-of-mass system. A rough pion-proton separation is achieved for the positive spectra. Fits of the form Aα to the cross sections are presented as functions of transverse momentum, longitudinal momentum, rapidity, and pseudorapidity. It is found that α changes from ∼0.85 to ∼0.60 for laboratory rapidities ranging from 4 to 8. Trends in the data differ markedly when examined in terms of pseudorapidity rather than rapidity. Qualitatively, the major features of our data can be understood in terms of current particle-production models.
At the electron-proton collider HERA the inclusive $D~{*\pm}$ meson photoproduction cross section has been measured with the H1 detector in two different, but partly overlapping, kinematical regions. For the first, where $\langle W_{\gamma p}\rangle \approx 200$\ GeV and $Q~2 < 0.01\,\gev~2$, the result is $\sigma(\gamma p \rightarrow c \bar{c} X) = (13.2 \pm 2.2 ~{+2.1}_{-1.7}\, ~{+9.9}_{-4.8})\,\mu b$. The second measurement for $Q~2 < 4\,\gev~2$ yields $\sigma(\gamma p \rightarrow c \bar{c} X) = ( 9.3 \pm 2.1 ~{+1.9}_{-1.8}\, ~{+6.9}_ {-3.2} )\,\mu b$ at $\langle W_{\gamma p}\rangle \approx 142$\,GeV and $\sigma(\gamma p \rightarrow c \bar{c} X) = ( 20.6 \pm 5.5 ~ {+4.3}_{-3.9}\, ~{+15.4}_{-7.2})\,\mu b$ at $\langle W_{\gamma p} \rangle \approx 230$\,GeV, respectively. The third error accounts for an additional uncertainty due to the proton and photon parton density parametrizations. Differential cross sections are presented as a function of the $D~{*\pm}$ transverse momentum and rapidity. The results compare reasonably well with next-to-leading order QCD calculations. Evidence for diffractive photoproduction of charm quark is presented.
The production of K_short mesons in pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 0.9 TeV is studied with the LHCb detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The luminosity of the analysed sample is determined using a novel technique, involving measurements of the beam currents, sizes and positions, and is found to be 6.8 +/- 1.0 microbarn^-1. The differential prompt K_short production cross-section is measured as a function of the K_short transverse momentum and rapidity in the region 0 < pT < 1.6 GeV/c and 2.5 < y < 4.0. The data are found to be in reasonable agreement with previous measurements and generator expectations.
The inclusive production of ϱ 0 mesons in pp collisions has been measured at five c.m. energies from √ s = 23.6 to 63.0 GeV. The cross sections and the production spectra as a function of transverse momentum and rapidity are discussed.
J/psi production has been measured in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s)= 200 GeV over a wide rapidity and transverse momentum range by the PHENIX experiment at RHIC. Distributions of the rapidity and transverse momentum, along with measurements of the mean transverse momentum and total production cross section are presented and compared to available theoretical calculations. The total J/psi cross section is 3.99 +/- 0.61(stat) +/- 0.58(sys) +/- 0.40(abs) micro barns. The mean transverse momentum is 1.80 +/- 0.23(stat) +/- 0.16(sys) GeV/c.
We report on measurements of the ϒ(1S), ϒ(2S), and ϒ(3S) differential, (d2σdPtdy)y=0, and integrated cross sections in pp¯ collisions at s=1.8 TeV using a sample of 16.6 ± 0.6 pb−1 collected by the Collider Detector at Fermilab. The three resonances were reconstructed through the decay ϒ→μ+μ−. Comparison is made to a leading order QCD prediction.
New results on the production of charged pions in p+p interactions are presented. The data come from a sample of 4.8 million inelastic events obtained with the NA49 detector at the CERN SPS at 158 GeV/c beam momentum. Pions are identified by energy loss measurement in a large TPC tracking system which covers a major fraction of the production phase space. Inclusive invariant cross sections are given on a grid of nearly 300 bins per charge over intervals from 0 to 2 GeV/c in transverse momentum and from 0 to 0.85 in Feynman x. The results are compared to existing data in overlapping energy ranges.
Production of charged kaons in proton-sulphur, proton-gold, sulphur-sulphur and oxygen-gold collisions at 200 GeV/nucleon has been studied in the NA35 Streamer Chamber experiment. Rapidity and transverse mass distributions as well as mean multiplicities were obtained. The results are compared with nucleon-nucleon data and with model predictions.
The transverse momentum and rapidity distributions of net protons and negatively charged hadrons have been measured for minimum bias proton-nucleus and deuteron-gold interactions, as well as central oxygen-gold and sulphur-nucleus collisions at 200 GeV per nucleon. The rapidity density of net protons at midrapidity in central nucleus-nucleus collisions increases both with target mass for sulphur projectiles and with the projectile mass for a gold target. The shape of the rapidity distributions of net protons forward of midrapidity for d+Au and central S+Au collisions is similar. The average rapidity loss is larger than 2 units of rapidity for reactions with the gold target. The transverse momentum spectra of net protons for all reactions can be described by a thermal distribution with `temperatures' between 145 +- 11 MeV (p+S interactions) and 244 +- 43 MeV (central S+Au collisions). The multiplicity of negatively charged hadrons increases with the mass of the colliding system. The shape of the transverse momentum spectra of negatively charged hadrons changes from minimum bias p+p and p+S interactions to p+Au and central nucleus-nucleus collisions. The mean transverse momentum is almost constant in the vicinity of midrapidity and shows little variation with the target and projectile masses. The average number of produced negatively charged hadrons per participant baryon increases slightly from p+p, p+A to central S+S,Ag collisions.
The production of electron-positron pairs of masses below 1200 MeV/ c 2 and of transverse momentum above 1.8 GeV/ c has been studied in pp collisions at √ s = 53 and 63 GeV. The cross section for ϱ, ω, and φ production are presented. The continuum below 600 MeV/ c 2 is consistent with origination from Dalitz decays of η and ω mesons and from semileptonic decay of D and D mesons.