Journal article

Publication year: 2020

Journal: Physical Review C

Volume number: 101

Issue number: 1

ISSN: 2469-9985

eISSN: 2469-9993

Open access status: Hybrid

DOI Link: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.101.014617

Publisher: American Physical Society

Abstract: 
Deep inelastic scattering (DIS) experiments at the planned Electron-Ion Collider will be affected by details of the hadron formation inside the nuclear volume. Besides semi-inclusive particle production experiments, decays of the target nucleus via emission of neutrons provide an additional opportunity to probe this domain. This paper reports on the hybrid dynamical+statistical calculations of low-energy neutron production in muon-induced and virtual photon-induced collisions with nuclei. We confirm the conclusion that the E665 data on neutron production in mu(-) + Pb DIS at 470 GeV indicate a strong suppression of the final-state interaction for hadrons with momenta above approximate to 1 GeV/c. Ultraperipheral heavy-ion collisions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) and the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) can be used to test this suppression. The calculations of the neutron multiplicity distributions and P-t spectra in photon-nucleus collisions at the energies accessible at the LHC and RHIC are presented for several models of hadron formation. We argue that studies of neutron production in ultraperipheral heavy-ion collisions open a window onto the small-x dynamics and hadron component of the photon wave function.

Harvard Citation style: Larionov, A. and Strikman, M. (2020) Slow-neutron production as a probe of hadron formation in high-energy γ*A reactions, Physical Review C, 101(1), Article 014617. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.101.014617

APA Citation style: Larionov, A., & Strikman, M. (2020). Slow-neutron production as a probe of hadron formation in high-energy γ*A reactions. Physical Review C. 101(1), Article 014617. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.101.014617