Production spectra of zero-degree neutral particles measured by the LHCf experiment

Abstract

Abstract. The LHC-forward (LHCf) experiment, situated at the LHC accelerator, has measured neutral particles production in a very forward region (pseudo-rapidity η > 8.4) in proton-proton and proton-lead collisions. The main purpose of the LHCf experiment is to test hadronic interaction models used in ground based cosmic rays experiments to simulate cosmic rays induced air-showers in the Earth's atmosphere. The experiment is composed of two independent detectors located at 140m from the AT-LAS interaction point (IP1) on opposite sides; each detector is composed of two sampling and position sensitive calorimeters. In this paper, latest published physics results from p-p and p-Pb collisions (at √ s = 7, 2.76 TeV and √ s NN = 5.02 TeV, respectively) compared with Monte Carlo predictions of DPMJET, EPOS, PYTHIA, QGSJET and SIBYLL event generators will be presented. In particular, the inclusive energy spectra of neutrons in p-p collisions and the transverse and longitudinal momentum spectra of neutral pions for different pseudo-rapidity ranges in p-p and p-Pb collisions will be shown; then, test of Feynman scaling hypothesis using neutral pion spectra will be discussed. Preliminary results of photon inclusive energy spectra in p-p collisions at √ s = 13 TeV will be also presented.