New physics from TOTEM’s recent measurements of elastic and total cross sections

Abstract

We analyze the recently discovered phenomena in elastic proton-proton scattering at the LHC, challenging the standard Regge-pole theory: the low-|t| "break" (departure from the exponential behavior of the diffraction cone), the accelerating rise with energy of the forward slope B(s, t = 0), the absence of secondary dips and bumps on the cone and the role of the odderon in the forward phase of the amplitude, ρ(13 T eV ) = 0.1 ± 0.01, and especially its contribution at the dip region, measured recently by TOTEM. Relative contributions from different components to the scattering amplitude are evaluated from the fitted model.

Pomeron/glueball and odderon/oddball trajectories

“…At LHC energies, the pomeron and its C-odd counterpart, the odderon, entirely dominate [34], however, to be consistent with the lower energy data, particularly those from the ISR, we include also two secondary reggeons (f and ω) in the fitting procedure.…”

“…The LHC data on proton-proton scattering, dominated by pomeron exchange, are the best for this purpose. At LHC energies the contribution of secondary trajectories is negligible [34].…”

“…We do it in Sec. 6 by using a dipole (DP) model that proved to be efficient in earlier studies [34,36,37].…”

“…The SP model is applicable only at low-|t|, to reproduce the higher-t features (dip-bump) of the experimental data a more developed model is required which includes also the odderon as its relative contribution increases with momentum transfer [3,34]. The presence of an odderon exchange allows us also to make predictions for the oddballs.…”

“…As in Ref. [34], we assume that the odderon contribution is of the same form as that of the pomeron, implying the relation A O = −iA P and different values of adjustable parameters (labeled by subscript "O"):…”