ALICE results on heavy-ion physics at the LHC

ALICE is a multipurpose detector for high-energy nucleus-nucleus physics at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. In November 2010, ALICE took its first Pb-Pb data at the center-of-mass energy of 2.76TeV per nucleon pair; reference data in proton-proton collisions at the same energy were collected in 2011. This paper gives an overview of the main physics results obtained with these data. In particular, I will present results on identified charged and strange particle transverse momentum spectra, on anisotropic flow of charged particles, on open heavy flavour and quarkonia production in Pb-Pb collisions, compared to pp collisions. These first Pb-Pb results from ALICE at LHC are broadly consistent with expectations based on lower energy RHIC and SPS data. They indicate that matter created in these collisions, while initially much larger and hotter, still behaves like a very strongly interacting, almost perfect liquid. A brief outlook on the expected results from the second, higher statistics Pb-Pb run of Fall 2011 will be given as well

Mass modification of D-meson in hot hadronic matter

We evaluate the in-medium $D$ and $\bar D$-meson masses in hot hadronic matter induced by interactions with the light hadron sector described in a chiral SU(3) model. The effective Lagrangian approach is generalized to SU(4) to include charmed mesons. We find that the D-mass drops substantially at finite temperatures and densities, which open the channels of the decay of the charmonium states ($\Psi^\prime$, $\chi_c$, $J/\Psi$) to $D \bar D$ pairs in the thermal medium. The effects of vacuum polarisations from the baryon sector on the medium modification of the $D$-meson mass relative to those obtained in the mean field approximation are investigated. The results of the present work are compared to calculations based on the QCD sum-rule approach, the quark-meson coupling model, chiral perturbation theory, as well as to studies of quarkonium dissociation using heavy quark potential from lattice QCD.Comment: 18 pages including 7 figures, minor revision of the text, figure styles modified, to appear in Phys. Rev.

Geometric Parameterization of J/ΨJ/\Psi Absorption in Heavy Ion Collisions

We calculate the survival probability of $J/\Psi$ particles in various colliding systems using a Glauber model. An analysis of recent data has reported a $J/\Psi$-nucleon breakup cross section of 6.2$\pm$0.7 mb derived from an exponential fit to the ratio of $J/\Psi$ to Drell-Yan yields as a function of a simple, linearly-averaged mean path length through the nuclear medium. Our calculations indicate that, due to the nature of the calculation, this approach yields an apparent breakup cross section which is systematically lower than the actual value.Comment: LaTex, 7 pages, 2 figure

The Future of Dancefloors: Building More Flexible, Open and Innovative Clubbing Experiences

Nightclubs across the world are in a state of crisis due to COVID-19, and neither inaction or ‘business as usual’ are viable options if the industry is to survive it. It has never been more important to question, innovate and re-imagine the status quo

A model-independent analysis of the dependence of the anomalous J/psi suppression on the number of participant nucleons

A recently published experimental dependence of the J/psi to Drell-Yan ratio on the measured, by a zero degree calorimeter, forward energy E_ZDC in Pb+Pb collisions at the CERN SPS is analyzed. Using a model-independent approach it is shown that the data are at variance with an earlier published experimental dependence of the same quantity on the transverse energy of neutral hadrons E_T. The discrepancy is related to a moderate centrality region: 100 < N_p < 200 (N_p is the number of participant nucleons) and is peculiar only to the data obtained within the `minimum bias' analysis (using the `theoretical Drell-Yan'). This could result from systematic experimental errors in the minimum bias sample. A possible source of the errors is discussed.Comment: 10 pages, LaTeX, 3 PS-figures. V2: Misprints are correcte

Coherent J/psi production - a novel feature at LHC?

Energy dependence of heavy quarkonia production in hadron-nucleus collisions is studied in the framework of the Glauber-Gribov theory. We emphasize a change in the space-time picture of heavy-quark state production on nuclei with energy. Longitudinally ordered scattering of a heavy-quark system takes place at low energies, while with increasing energy it transforms to a coherent scattering of projectile partons on the nuclear target. The characteristic energy scale for this transition depends on masses and rapidities of produced particles. For J/psi, produced in the central rapidity region, the transition happens at RHIC energies. The parameter-free calculation of J/psi in dAu collisions is in good agreement with recent RHIC data. We use distributions of gluons in nuclei to predict suppression of heavy quarkonia at LHC.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures; experimental data and reference included, conclusions unchanged; to appear in Phys. Lett.

Characterisation of silicon strip detectors with a binary readout chip for X-ray imaging

In this paper we describe the development of a multichannel readout system for X-ray measurements using silicon strip detectors. The developed system is based on a binary readout architecture and optimised for detection of X-rays of energies in the range 6}30 keV. The critical component of the system is the 32-channel front-end chip, RX32N, which has been optimised for low noise performance, small channel to channel variation and high counting rate operation. The performance of the chip is demonstrated by measurements of complex X-ray spectra using silicon strip and pad detectors. The obtained results allow to use the system at room temperature with the detection threshold in the range from 500 to 10 000 electrons, which is enough in many crystallographic and medical imaging applications. ( 2000 Elsevier Scienc

Charmonium suppression at RHIC and SPS: a hadronic baseline

A kinetic equation approach is applied to model anomalous J/psi suppression at RHIC and SPS by absorption in a hadron resonance gas which successfully describes statistical hadron production in both experiments. The puzzling rapidity dependence of the PHENIX data is reproduced as a geometric effect due to a longer absorption path for J/psi production at forward rapidity.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures, final version accepted for publication in Phys. Lett.