This manual describes the PYTHIA 8.3 event generator, the most recent version of an evolving physics tool used to answer fundamental questions in particle physics. The program is most often used to generate high-energy-physics collision "events", i.e. sets of particles produced in association with the collision of two incoming high-energy particles, but has several uses beyond that. The guiding philosophy is to produce and re-produce properties of experimentally obtained collisions as accurately as possible. The program includes a wide ranges of reactions within and beyond the Standard Model, and extending to heavy ion physics. Emphasis is put on phenomena where strong interactions play a major role.The manual contains both pedagogical and practical components. All included physics models are described in enough detail to allow the user to obtain a cursory overview of used assumptions and approximations, enabling an informed evaluation of the program output. A number of the most central algorithms are described in enough detail that the main results of the program can be reproduced independently, allowing further development of existing models or the addition of new ones.Finally, a chapter dedicated fully to the user is included towards the end, providing pedagogical examples of standard use cases, and a detailed description of a number of external interfaces. The program code, the online manual, and the latest version of this print manual can be found on the PYTHIA web

This manual describes the Pythia event generator, the most recent version of an evolving physics tool used to answer fundamental questions in particle physics. The program is most often used to generate high-energy-physics collision “events”, i.e. sets of particles produced in association with the collision of two incoming high-energy particles, but has several uses beyond that. The guiding philosophy is to produce and re-produce properties of experimentally obtained collisions as accurately as possible. The program includes a wide ranges of reactions within and beyond the Standard Model, and extending to heavy ion physics. Emphasis is put on phenomena where strong interactions play a major role. The manual contains both pedagogical and practical components. All included physics models are described in enough detail to allow the user to obtain a cursory overview of used assumptions and approximations, enabling an informed evaluation of the program output. A number of the most central algorithms are described in enough detail that the main results of the program can be reproduced independently, allowing further development of existing models or the addition of new ones. Finally, a chapter dedicated fully to the user is included towards the end, providing pedagogical examples of standard use cases, and a detailed description of a number of external interfaces. The program code, the online manual, and the latest version of this print manual can be found on the Pythia web page: https://www.pythia.org/.

Based on the recent success of the Angantyr model in describing multiplicity distributions of the hadronic final state in high energy heavy ion collisions, we investigate how far one can go with a such a string-based scenario to describe also flow effects measured in such collisions.For this purpose we improve our previous so-called shoving model, where strings that are close in space-time tend to repel each other in a way that could generate anisotropic flow, and we find that this model can indeed generate such flows in AA collisions. The flow generated is not quite enough to reproduce measurements, but we identify some shortcomings in the presented implementation of the model that, when fixed, could plausibly give a more realistic amount of flow.

We revisit the recipe for hadron formation in the Lund string hadronization model. Given an incoming quark or quark-diquark pair, weights for hadron formation are updated to take hyperfine splitting effects arising from the mass difference between $$\mathrm {u,d}$$ u , d -type and $$\mathrm {s}$$ s -type quarks. We find that the procedure improves the description of hadron yields in $$\mathrm {e}^+\mathrm {e}^-$$ e + e - collisions and the $$\phi $$ ϕ cross section in neutral current DIS. We also show results for proton collisions, and discuss the future use of this study in the context of small system collectivity.

This paper is a write-up of the ideas that were presented, developed and discussed at the third International Workshop on QCD Challenges from pp to A–A, which took place in August 2019 in Lund, Sweden (Workshop link: https://indico.lucas.lu.se/event/1214/). The goal of the workshop was to focus on some of the open questions in the field and try to come up with concrete suggestions for how to make progress on both the experimental and theoretical sides. The paper gives a brief introduction to each topic and then summarizes the primary results.