Probing fluctuating protons using forward neutrons in soft and hard inelastic proton-nucleus scattering

2025/04/10 by Alvioli, M., Guzey, V., Strikman, M.
#FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex) #High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph) #Nuclear Experiment (nucl-ex)

paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2504.07514

Abstract

We present a model for the distribution of the number of forward neutrons emitted in soft (minimum bias) and hard inelastic proton-nucleus (pA) scattering at the LHC. It is based on the Gribov-Glauber model for the distribution over the number of inelastic collisions (wounded nucleons) combined with a parametrization of cross section (color) fluctuations in the projectile proton, which depend on the parton momentum fraction x_p, and the assumption of independent neutron emissions. We observe that while the effect of soft color fluctuations is modest, a reduction of the interaction strength with increasing x_p provides the dominant effect. It allows us to qualitatively describe the trend of the ATLAS data on the ZDC energy spectra of forward neutrons emitted in dijet production in inelastic pA scattering at √s_NN=8.16 TeV.

Related

• Color fluctuation effects in proton–nucleus collisions
• Slicing Pomerons in ultraperipheral collisions using forward neutrons from nuclear breakup
• Nuclear modification of forward J/ψ production in proton-nucleus collisions at the LHC
• Forward dijet production at the LHC within an impact parameter dependent TMD approach
• Forward elastic scattering: Dynamical gluon mass and semihard interactions