Measurement of ϕ meson production in p+p interactions at 40, 80 and 158GeV/c with the NA61/SHINE spectrometer at the CERN SPS

• Published in: The European physical journal. C, Particles and fields Particles and fields, 2020-03, Vol.80 (3)
• Main Authors: Andronov, E V, Antićić, T, Babkin, V, Baszczyk, M, Bhosale, S, Blondel, A, Brandin, A, Bravar, A, Brzychczyk, J, Buryakov, M, Busygina, O, Bzdak, A, Cherif, H, Cybowska, J, Davis, N, Deliyergiyev, M, Dmitriev, A, Dominik, W, Dumarchez, J, Engel, R, Fields, L, Golosov, O, Golovatyuk, V, Golubeva, M, Grebieszkow, K, Haesler, A, Ilieva, S, Ivashkin, A, Kadija, K, Kaptur, E, Kargin, N, Kashirin, E, Kireyeu, V A, Klochkov, V, Kolesnikov, V I, Kolev, D, Korzenev, A, Kovalenko, V N, Kowalski, S, Koziel, M, Krasnoperov, A, Kucewicz, W, Kuich, M, Kurepin, A, László, A, Lazareva, T V, Łojek, K, Łysakowski, B, Lyubushkin, V V, Malakhov, A I, Manić, D, Marchionni, A, Marcinek, A, Marton, K, Melkumov, G L, Merzlaya, A O, Messerly, B, Mrówczyński, S, Nagai, Y, Naskręt, M, Ozvenchuk, V, Pavin, M, Petukhov, O, Płaneta, R, Podlaski, P, Popov, B A, Prokhorova, D S, Pszczel, D, Puławski, S, Puzović, J, Ravonel, M, Renfordt, R, Richter-Wąs, E, Rumberger, B T, Rybicki, A, Sadovsky, A, Schmidt, K, Selyuzhenkov, I, Seyboth, P, Słodkowski, M, Staszel, P, Stefanek, G, Stepaniak, J, Strikhanov, M, Tefelska, A, Tefelski, D, Tereshchenko, V, Toia, A, Tsenov, R, Turko, L, Ulrich, R, Unger, M, Valiev, F F, Veberič, D, Vechernin, V V, Wickremasinghe, A, Wojtaszek-Szwarc, A, Zambelli, L, Zimmerman, E D, Zwaska, R
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: CERN; Collisions; Differential thermal analysis; Mass spectra; Mesons; Particle production; Proton beams; Synchrotrons; Transverse momentum
• ISSN: 1434-6044; 1434-6052
• DOI: 10.1140/epjc/s10052-020-7675-6

Results on ϕ meson production in inelastic p+p collisions at CERN SPS energies are presented. They are derived from data collected by the NA61/SHINE fixed target experiment, by means of invariant mass spectra fits in the ϕ→K+K- decay channel. They include the first ever measured double differential spectra of ϕ mesons as a function of rapidity y and transverse momentum pT for proton beam momenta of 80GeV/c and 158GeV/c, as well as single differential spectra of y or pT for beam momentum of 40GeV/c. The corresponding total ϕ yields per inelastic p+p event are obtained. These results are compared with existing data on ϕ meson production in p+p collisions. The comparison shows consistency but superior accuracy of the present measurements. The emission of ϕ mesons in p+p reactions is confronted with that occurring in Pb+Pb collisions, and the experimental results are compared with model predictions. It appears that none of the considered models can properly describe all the experimental observations.