The production of Λ baryons and K0Smesons (V0particles) was measured in p–Pbcollisions at √sNN=5.02TeV and pp collisions at √s=7TeV with ALICE at the LHC. The production of these strange particles is ...studied separately for particles associated with hard scatterings and the underlying event to shed light on the baryon-to-meson ratio enhancement observed at intermediate transverse momentum (pT) in high multiplicity pp and p–Pbcollisions. Hard scatterings are selected on an event-by-event basis with jets reconstructed with the anti-kTalgorithm using charged particles. The production of strange particles associated with jets pchT,jet>10and pchT,jet>20GeV/cin p–Pbcollisions, and with jet pchT,jet>10GeV/cin pp collisions is reported as a function of pT. Its dependence on angular distance from the jet axis, R(V0, jet), for jets with pchT,jet>10GeV/cin p–Pbcollisions is reported as well. The pT-differential production spectra of strange particles associated with jets are found to be harder compared to that in the underlying event and both differ from the inclusive measurements. In events containing a jet, the density of the V0particles in the underlying event is found to be larger than the density in the minimum bias events. The Λ/K0Sratio associated with jets in p–Pbcollisions is consistent with the ratio in pp collisions and follows the expectation of jets fragmenting in vacuum. On the other hand, this ratio within jets is consistently lower than the one obtained in the underlying event and it does not show the characteristic enhancement of baryons at intermediate pToften referred to as “baryon anomaly” in the inclusive measurements.
The production of light neutral mesons in AA collisions probes the physics of the Quark-Gluon Plasma (QGP), which is formed in heavy-ion collisions at the LHC. More specifically, the centrality ...dependent neutral meson spectra in AA collisions compared to its spectra in minimum-bias pp collisions, scaled with the number of hard collisions, provides information on the energy loss of partons traversing the QGP. The measurement allows to test with high precision the predictions of theoretical model calculations. In addition, the decay of the π0 and η mesons are the dominant back- grounds for all direct photon measurements. Therefore, pushing the limits of the precision of neutral meson production is key to learning about the temperature and space-time evolution of the QGP.
In the ALICE experiment neutral mesons can be detected via their decay into two photons. The latter can be reconstructed using the two calorimeters EMCal and PHOS or via conversions in the detector material. The excellent momentum resolution of the conversion photons down to very low pT and the high reconstruction efficiency and triggering capability of calorimeters at high pT, allow us to measure the pT dependent invariant yield of light neutral mesons over a wide kinematic range.
Combining state-of-the-art reconstruction techniques with the high statistics delivered by the LHC in Run 2 gives us the opportunity to enhance the precision of our measurements. In these proceedings, new ALICE run 2 preliminary results for neutral meson production in pp and Pb–Pb collisions at LHC energies are presented.
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