Alignment of the ALICE Inner Tracking System with cosmic-ray tracks

37 pages, 15 figures, revised version, accepted by JINSTALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) is the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) experiment devoted to investigating the strongly interacting matter created in nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC energies. The ALICE ITS, Inner Tracking System, consists of six cylindrical layers of silicon detectors with three different technologies; in the outward direction: two layers of pixel detectors, two layers each of drift, and strip detectors. The number of parameters to be determined in the spatial alignment of the 2198 sensor modules of the ITS is about 13,000. The target alignment precision is well below 10 micron in some cases (pixels). The sources of alignment information include survey measurements, and the reconstructed tracks from cosmic rays and from proton-proton collisions. The main track-based alignment method uses the Millepede global approach. An iterative local method was developed and used as well. We present the results obtained for the ITS alignment using about 10^5 charged tracks from cosmic rays that have been collected during summer 2008, with the ALICE solenoidal magnet switched off.Peer reviewe

Midrapidity antiproton-to-proton ratio in pp collisons root s=0.9 and 7 TeV measured by the ALICE experiment

The ratio of the yields of antiprotons to protons in pp collisions has been measured by the ALICE experiment at root s = 0.9 and 7 TeV during the initial running periods of the Large Hadron Collider. The measurement covers the transverse momentum interval 0.45 < p(t) < 1.05 GeV/c and rapidity vertical bar y vertical bar < 0.5. The ratio is measured to be R-vertical bar y vertical bar<0.5 = 0.957 +/- 0.006(stat) +/- 0.0014(syst) at 0.9 Tev and R-vertical bar y vertical bar<0.5 = 0.991 +/- 0.005 +/- 0.014(syst) at 7 TeV and it is independent of both rapidity and transverse momentum. The results are consistent with the conventional model of baryon-number transport and set stringent limits on any additional contributions to baryon-number transfer over very large rapidity intervals in pp collisions

Femtoscopy of pp collisions at √s=0.9 and 7 TeV at the LHC with two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations

We report on the high statistics two-pion correlation functions from pp collisions at root s = 0.9 TeV and root s = 7 TeV, measured by the ALICE experiment at the Large Hadron Collider. The correlation functions as well as the extracted source radii scale with event multiplicity and pair momentum. When analyzed in the same multiplicity and pair transverse momentum range, the correlation is similar at the two collision energies. A three-dimensional femtoscopic analysis shows an increase of the emission zone with increasing event multiplicity as well as decreasing homogeneity lengths with increasing transverse momentum. The latter trend gets more pronounced as multiplicity increases. This suggests the development of space-momentum correlations, at least for collisions producing a high multiplicity of particles. We consider these trends in the context of previous femtoscopic studies in high-energy hadron and heavy-ion collisions and discuss possible underlying physics mechanisms. Detailed analysis of the correlation reveals an exponential shape in the outward and longitudinal directions, while the sideward remains a Gaussian. This is interpreted as a result of a significant contribution of strongly decaying resonances to the emission region shape. Significant nonfemtoscopic correlations are observed, and are argued to be the consequence of "mini-jet"-like structures extending to low p(t). They are well reproduced by the Monte-Carlo generators and seen also in pi(+)pi(-) correlations

Long-range angular correlations of pi, K and p in p-Pb collisions at root s(NN)=5.02 TeV

Angular correlations between unidentified charged trigger particles and various species of charged associated particles (unidentified particles, pions, kaons, protons and antiprotons) are measured by the ALICE detector in p-Pb collisions at a nucleon-nucleon centre-of-mass energy of 5.02 TeV in the transverse-momentum range 0.3 < p(T) < 4 GeV/c. The correlations expressed as associated yield per trigger particle are obtained in the pseudorapidity range vertical bar n(lab)vertical bar < 0.8. Fourier coefficients are extracted from the long-range correlations projected onto the azimuthal angle difference and studied as a function of p(T) and in intervals of event multiplicity. In high-multiplicity events, the second-order coefficient for protons, 4, is observed to be smaller than that for pions, v(2)(pi), up to about p(T) = 2 GeV/c. To reduce correlations due to jets, the per-trigger yield measured in low-multiplicity events is subtracted from that in high-multiplicity events. A two-ridge structure is obtained for all particle species. The Fourier decomposition of this structure shows that the second-order coefficients for pions and kaons are similar. The v(2)(p) is found to be smaller at low P-T and larger at higher p(T) than v(2)(pi), with a crossing occurring at about 2 GeV/c. This is qualitatively similar to the elliptic-flow pattern observed in heavy-ion collisions. A mass ordering effect at low transverse momenta is consistent with expectations from hydrodynamic model calculations assuming a collectively expanding system. (C) 2013 CERN. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.7264169916417

Gamma-aminobutyric acid uptake and the termination of inhibitory synaptic potentials in the rat hippocampal slice.

Intracellular recordings were made from CA1 pyramidal cells in the rat hippocampal slice to study the processes that influence the time course of inhibitory post-synaptic potentials (i.p.s.p.s) mediated by gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), and conductance changes evoked by ionophoretically applied GABA. The GABA-uptake inhibitors, nipecotic acid and cis-4-OH-nipecotic acid (1 mM), greatly prolonged conductance increases associated with both hyperpolarizing and depolarizing responses to ionophoretically applied GABA. In contrast to their effects on GABA-evoked conductances, uptake inhibitors only slightly prolonged antidromically evoked i.p.s.p.s. Their primary effect occurred after the i.p.s.p. had decayed to 5-30% of its peak. 4-OH-isonipecotic acid, a nipecotic acid analogue that does not inhibit GABA uptake, did not prolong i.p.s.p.s or ionophoretically evoked conductance changes. Sodium pentobarbitone (100 microM), a drug that prolongs the open time of GABA-activated chloride channels, potentiated both i.p.s.p.s and responses to ionophoretically applied GABA. Whereas pentobarbitone also prolonged i.p.s.p.s, it did not prolong responses to ionophoretically applied GABA. The prolongation of i.p.s.p.s by pentobarbitone occurred equally in both the early and late phases of the i.p.s.p., in contrast to the effects of GABA-uptake inhibitors. I.p.s.p.s did not usually decay exponentially. The observation that uptake inhibitors prolonged the late but not the early decay phase of the i.p.s.p., together with the previous finding that the conductance change persists for the duration of the i.p.s.p., indicate that GABA is present in the synapse throughout much of the i.p.s.p. These data suggest that diffusion of GABA out of the synapse, a non-exponential process, is an important determinant of the i.p.s.p. decay time course. Increasing the extracellular potassium concentration from 3.5 to 8.5 mM resulted in spontaneously occurring, synchronous burst firing of pyramidal cells. Cis-4-OH-nipecotic acid significantly reduced the number and amplitude of extracellularly recorded population spikes within each burst. We conclude that diffusion, channel open time and GABA uptake all influence the time course of GABA-mediated i.p.s.p.s. The time course of a single, brief i.p.s.p. is determined predominantly by post-synaptic channel kinetics and diffusion of GABA out of the synapse, whereas the inhibition produced by prolonged synaptic bursts or relatively long application of exogenous GABA can be markedly influenced by GABA uptake.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS

Higher harmonic anisotropic flow measurements of charged particles in Pb-Pb collisions at √sNN=2.76TeV

We report on the first measurement of the triangular nu(3), quadrangular nu(4), and pentagonal nu(5) charged particle flow in Pb-Pb collisions at root s(NN) = 2.76 TeV measured with the ALICE detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. We show that the triangular flow can be described in terms of the initial spatial anisotropy and its fluctuations, which provides strong constraints on its origin. In the most central events, where the elliptic flow nu(2) and nu(3) have similar magnitude, a double peaked structure in the two-particle azimuthal correlations is observed, which is often interpreted as a Mach cone response to fast partons. We show that this structure can be naturally explained from the measured anisotropic flow Fourier coefficients

Two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations in pp collisions at root s=900 GeV

We report on the measurement of two-pion correlation functions from pp collisions at root s = 900 GeV performed by the ALICE experiment at the Large Hadron Collider. Our analysis shows an increase of the Hanbury Brown-Twiss radius with increasing event multiplicity, in line with other measurements done in particle- and nuclear collisions. Conversely, the strong decrease of the radius with increasing transverse momentum, as observed at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider and at Tevatron, is not manifest in our data