Estimation of Collision Impact Parameter

Abstract

We demonstrate that the nuclear collision geometry (i.e. impact parameter) can be determined with 1.5 fm accuracy in an event-by-event analysis by measuring the transverse energy flow in the pseudorapidity region $3 \le |\eta| \le 5$ with a minimal dependence on collision dynamics details at the LHC energy scale. Using the HIJING model we have illustrated our calculation by a simulation of events of nucleus-nucleus interactions at the c.m.s energy from 1 up to 5.5 TeV per nucleon and various type of nuclei.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure