Photon Multiplicity Measurements : From SPS to RHIC and LHC

Abstract

Results from the photon multiplicity measurements using a fine granularity preshower photon multiplicity detector (PMD) at CERN SPS are discussed. These include study of pseudo-rapidity distributions of photons, scaling of photon multiplicity with number of participating nucleons, centrality dependence of mean transverse momentum of photons, event-by-event fluctuations in photon multiplicity and localised charged-neutral fluctuations. Basic features of the PMD to be used in STAR experiment at RHIC and in ALICE experiment at LHC are also discussed.Comment: 12 pages, Invited talk at the 4th International Conference on the Physcis and Astrophysics of the Quark-Gluon-Plasma, November 2001, Jaipur, India, to appear in Praman