From QCD-based hard-scattering to nonextensive statistical mechanical descriptions of transverse momentum spectra in high-energy \(pp\) and \(p\bar p\) collisions

Transverse spectra of both jets and hadrons obtained in high-energy \(pp\) and \(p\bar p \) collisions at central rapidity exhibit power-law behavior of \(1/p_T^n\) at high \(p_T\). The power index \(n\) is 4-5 for jet production and is 6-10 for hadron production. Furthermore, the hadron spectra spa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2015-05
Main Authors: Cheuk-Yin Wong, Wilk, Grzegorz, Cirto, Leonardo J L, Tsallis, Constantino
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Collisions
Hadrons
Partons
Scattering
Spectra
Transverse momentum
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Transverse spectra of both jets and hadrons obtained in high-energy \(pp\) and \(p\bar p \) collisions at central rapidity exhibit power-law behavior of \(1/p_T^n\) at high \(p_T\). The power index \(n\) is 4-5 for jet production and is 6-10 for hadron production. Furthermore, the hadron spectra spanning over 14 orders of magnitude down to the lowest \(p_T\) region in \(pp\) collisions at LHC can be adequately described by a single nonextensive statistical mechanical distribution that is widely used in other branches of science. This suggests indirectly the possible dominance of the hard-scattering process over essentially the whole \(p_T\) region at central rapidity in high-energy \(pp\) and \(p \bar p\) collisions. We show here direct evidences of such a dominance of the hard-scattering process by investigating the power indices of UA1 and ATLAS jet spectra over an extended \(p_T\) region and the two-particle correlation data of the STAR and PHENIX Collaborations in high-energy \(pp\) and \(p \bar p\) collisions at central rapidity. We then study how the showering of the hard-scattering product partons alters the power index of the hadron spectra and leads to a hadron distribution that may be cast into a single-particle nonextensive statistical mechanical distribution. Because of such a connection, the nonextensive statistical mechanical distribution may be considered as a lowest-order approximation of the hard-scattering of partons followed by the subsequent process of parton showering that turns the jets into hadrons, in high energy \(pp\) and \(p\bar p\) collisions.
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.1505.02022