The NA44 collaboration has measured charged kaon and pion distributions at midrapidity in sulphur and proton collisions with nuclear targets at 200 and 450 GeV/c per nucleon, respectively. The inverse slopes of kaons are larger than those of pions. The difference in the inverse slopes of pions, kaons and protons, all measured in our spectrometer, increases with system size and is consistent with the buildup of collective flow for larger systems. The target dependence of both the yields and inverse slopes is stronger for the sulphur beam suggesting the increased importance of secondary rescattering for SA reactions. The rapidity density, dN/dy, of both K+ and K- increases more rapidly with system size than for pi+ in a similar rapidity region. This trend continues with increasing centrality, and according to RQMD, it is caused by secondary reactions between mesons and baryons. The K-/K+ ratio falls with increasing system size but more slowly than the pbar/p ratio. The pi-/pi+ ratio is close to unity for all systems. From pBe to SPb the K+/p ratio decreases while K-/pbar increases and ({K+*K-}/{p*pbar})**1/2 stays constant. These data suggest that as larger nuclei collide, the resulting system has a larger transverse expansion, baryon density and an increasing fraction of strange quarks.
The NA44 Collaboration has measured yields and differential distributions of K+, K-, pi+, pi- in transverse kinetic energy and rapidity, around the center-of-mass rapidity in 158 A GeV/c Pb+Pb collisions at the CERN SPS. A considerable enhancement of K+ production per pi is observed, as compared to p+p collisions at this energy. To illustrate the importance of secondary hadron rescattering as an enhancement mechanism, we compare strangeness production at the SPS and AGS with predictions of the transport model RQMD.
Transverse mass spectra of pions, kaons, and protons from the symmetric heavy-ion collisions 200 A GeV S+S and 158 A GeV Pb+Pb, measured in the NA44 focusing spectrometer at CERN, are presented. The mass dependence of the slope parameters provides evidence of collective transverse flow from expansion of the system in heavy-ion induced central collisions.
Antiproton production cross sections have been measured for minimum bias and central Si+Al and Si+Au collisions at 14.6 A GeV c . The data presented cover the range of transverse momentum from 0.3 to 1.2 GeV c and lab rapidities from 1.1 to 1.7 units. The relative p π − and p K − yields are found to be the smallest for the heaviest system measured, central Si+Au collisions. For these collisions, the p π − ratio, determined from integrated yields for 1.1⩽ y ⩽1.7, is (0.84±0.07)×10 −3 . In the same rapidity interval, the average antiproton inverse m ⊥ slope is 141±14 MeV for central Si+Al and central Si+Au collisions.
The production of π±,K±,p has been measured in p+Be and p+Au collisions for comparison with central Si+Au collisions. The inverse slope parameters T0 obtained by an exponential fit to the invariant cross sections in transverse mass are found to be, T0p,K+,ππ∼140–160 MeV in p+A collisions, whereas in central Si+Au collisions, T0p,K+∼200–220 MeV >T0ππ∼140–160 MeV at midrapidity. The π± and K+ distributions are shifted backwards in p+Au compared with p+Be. A gradual increase of (dn/dy)K+ per projectile nucleon is observed from p+Be to p+Au to central Si+Au collisions, while pions show no significant increase.
K − /K + and p ¯ / p ratios measured in 158 A·GeV Pb+Pb collisions are shown as a function of transverse momentum P T and centrality in top 8.5% central region. Little centrality dependence of the K − / K + and p ¯ / p ratios is observed. The transverse mass m T distribution and dN/dy of K + , K − , p and p ¯ around mid-rapidity are obtained. The temperature T ch and the chemical potentials for both light and strange quarks (μ q , μ s ) at chemical freeze-out are determined by applying simple thermodynamical model to the present data. The resultant μ q , μ s and T ch are compared with those obtained from similar analysis of SPS S+A and AGS Si+A data. The chemical freeze-out temperature T ch at CERN energies is higher than thermal freeze-out temperature T fo which is extracted from m T distribution of charged hadrons. At AGS energies T ch is close to T fo .
Single particle distributions of π ± , K ± , p , p and d near mid-rapidity from 450 GeV/c p A and 200 GeV/c per nucleon SA collisions are presented. Inverse slope parameters are extracted from the transverse mass spectra, and examined for indications of collective phenomena. Proton and antiproton yields are determined for different projectile-target combinations. First results from 160 GeV/c per nucleon PbPb collisions are presented.
The ALICE measurement of K$^0_{\rm S}$ and $\rm\Lambda$ production at mid-rapidity in Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 2.76$ TeV is presented. The transverse momentum ($p_{\rm T}$) spectra are shown for several collision centrality intervals and in the $p_{\rm T}$ range from 0.4 GeV/$c$ (0.6 GeV/$c$ for $\rm\Lambda$) to 12 GeV/$c$. The $p_{\rm T}$ dependence of the $\rm \Lambda$/K$^0_{\rm S}$ ratios exhibits maxima in the vicinity of 3 GeV/$c$, and the positions of the maxima shift towards higher $p_{\rm T}$ with increasing collision centrality. The magnitude of these maxima increases by almost a factor of three between most peripheral and most central Pb-Pb collisions. This baryon excess at intermediate $p_{\rm T}$ is not observed in pp interactions at sqrt(s) = 0.9 TeV and at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV. Qualitatively, the baryon enhancement in heavy-ion collisions is expected from radial flow. However, the measured $p_{\rm T}$ spectra above 2 GeV/$c$ progressively decouple from hydrodynamical-model calculations. For higher values of $p_{\rm T}$, models that incorporate the influence of the medium on the fragmentation and hadronization processes describe qualitatively the $p_{\rm T}$ dependence of the $\rm\Lambda$/K$^0_{\rm S}$ ratio.
The production of $\Lambda$ baryons and ${\rm K}^{0}_{\rm S}$ mesons (${\rm V}^{0}$ particles) was measured in p-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 5.02$ TeV and pp collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 7$ TeV with ALICE at the LHC. The production of these strange particles is studied separately for particles associated with hard scatterings and the underlying event to shed light on the baryon-to-meson ratio enhancement observed at intermediate transverse momentum ($p_{\rm T}$) in high multiplicity pp and p-Pb collisions. Hard scatterings are selected on an event-by-event basis with jets reconstructed with the anti-$k_{\rm T}$ algorithm using charged particles. The production of strange particles associated with jets $p_{\rm T,\;jet}^{\rm ch}>10$ and $p_{\rm T,\;jet}^{\rm ch}>20$ GeV/$c$ in p-Pb collisions, and with jet $p_{\rm T,\;jet}^{\rm ch}>10$ GeV/$c$ in pp collisions is reported as a function of $p_{\rm T}$. Its dependence on angular distance from the jet axis, $R({\rm V}^{0},\;{\rm jet})$, for jets with $p_{\rm T,\;jet}^{\rm ch}>10$ GeV/$c$ in p-Pb collisions is reported as well. The $p_{\rm T}$-differential production spectra of strange particles associated with jets are found to be harder compared to that in the underlying event and both differ from the inclusive measurements. In events containing a jet, the density of the ${\rm V}^{0}$ particles in the underlying event is found to be larger than the density in the minimum bias events. The $\Lambda/{\rm K}^{0}_{\rm S}$ ratio associated with jets in p-Pb collisions is consistent with the ratio in pp collisions and follows the expectation of jets fragmenting in vacuum. On the other hand, this ratio within jets is consistently lower than the one obtained in the underlying event and it does not show the characteristic enhancement of baryons at intermediate $p_{\rm T}$ often referred to as "baryon anomaly" in the inclusive measurements.
The $p_{\rm T}$-differential inclusive production cross section of the prompt charm-strange meson $\rm D_s^+$ in the rapidity range $|y|<0.5$ was measured in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s}=7$ TeV at the LHC using the ALICE detector. The analysis was performed on a data sample of $2.98 \times 10^8$ events collected with a minimum-bias trigger. The corresponding integrated luminosity is $L_{\rm int}=4.8$/nb. Reconstructing the decay ${\rm D_s^{+}\to \phi\pi^+}$, with $\phi\to {\rm K}^-{\rm K}^+$, and its charge conjugate, about 480 ${\rm D_s^{\pm}}$ mesons were counted, after selection cuts, in the transverse momentum range $2<p_{\rm T}<12$ Gev/$c$. The results are compared with predictions from models based on perturbative QCD. The ratios of the cross sections of four D meson species (namely ${\rm D^0}$, ${\rm D^+}$, ${\rm D^{*+}}$ and ${\rm D_s^+}$) were determined both as a function of $p_{\rm T}$ and integrated over $p_{\rm T}$ after extrapolating to full $p_{\rm T}$ range, together with the strangeness suppression factor in charm fragmentation. The obtained values are found to be compatible within uncertainties with those measured by other experiments in $\rm e^+e^-$, ep and pp interactions at various centre-of-mass energies.
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