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Register a new userCoherent diffractive photoproduction of $rho^{0}$ mesons on gold nuclei at RHIC
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The STAR Collaboration reports on the photoproduction of $pi^+pi^-$ pairs in gold-gold collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 200 GeV/nucleon-pair. These pion pairs are produced when a nearly-real photon emitted by one ion scatters from the other ion. We fit the $pi^+pi^-$ invariant mass spectrum with a combination of $rho$ and $omega$ resonances and a direct $pi^+pi^-$ continuum. This is the first observation of the $omega$ in ultra-peripheral collisions, and the first measurement of $rho-omega$ interference at energies where photoproduction is dominated by Pomeron exchange. The $omega$ amplitude is consistent with the measured $gamma prightarrow omega p$ cross section, a classical Glauber calculation and the $omegarightarrowpi^+pi^-$ branching ratio. The $omega$ phase angle is similar to that observed at much lower energies, showing that the $rho-omega$ phase difference does not depend significantly on photon energy. The $rho^0$ differential cross section $dsigma/dt$ exhibits a clear diffraction pattern, compatible with scattering from a gold nucleus, with 2 minima visible. The positions of the diffractive minima agree better with the predictions of a quantum Glauber calculation that does not include nuclear shadowing than with a calculation that does include shadowing.
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Vector meson photoproduction offers the opportunity to image target nuclei. The two-dimensional Fourier transform $dsigma_{rm coherent}/dt$ of coherent vector meson photoproduction gives the two-dimensional distribution of interaction sites in the target. Since vector meson photoproduction occurs, at lowest order, via two-gluon exchange, this is sensitive to gluon shadowing. We present an analysis of $pi^+pi^-$ photoproduction using data from the STAR detector and a study of $dsigma_{rm coherent}/dt$, with an emphasis on probing the nuclear shape and its systematic uncertainties.
A large reduction of the rho^0 mass in the nuclear medium is reported, inferred from dipion photoproduction spectra in the 1 GeV region, for the reaction 3He(gamma,pi+ pi-)X with a 10% duty factor tagged-photon beam and the TAGX multi-particle spectrometer. The energy range covered (800 < E(gamma) < 1120 MeV) lies mostly below the free rho^0 production threshold, a region which is believed sensitive to modifications of light vector-meson properties at nuclear-matter densities. The rho^0 masses extracted from the MC fitting of the data, m*(rho^0) = 642 +/- 40, 669 +/- 32, and 682 +/- 56 MeV/c^2 for E(gamma) in the 800-880, 880-960, and 960-1040 MeV regions respectively, are independently corroborated by a measured, assumption-free, kinematical observable. This mass shift, far exceeding current mean-field driven theoretical predictions, may be suggestive of rho^0 decay within the range of the nucleonic field.
Coherent photoproduction of $pi^0$-mesons from threshold ($E_{th} approx$ 136 MeV) throughout the $Delta$-resonance region and of $eta$-mesons close to the production threshold ($E_{th} approx$ 570 MeV for $eta$) has been measured for $^7$Li nuclei. The experiment was performed using the tagged-photon beam of the Mainz MAMI accelerator with the Crystal Ball and TAPS detectors combined to give an almost 4$pi$ solid-angle electromagnetic calorimeter. The reactions were identified by a combined invariant-mass and missing-energy analysis. A comparison of the pion data to plane-wave impulse modelling tests the nuclear mass form factor. So far coherent $eta$-production had been only identified for the lightest nuclear systems ($^2$H and $^3$He). For $^3$He a large enhancement of the cross section above plane-wave approximations had been reported, indicating the formation of a quasi-bound state. The present Li-data for $eta$-production agree with a plane-wave approximation. Contrary to $^3$He, neither a threshold enhancement of the total cross section nor a deviation of the angular distributions from the expected form-factor dependence were observed.
We argue that with an increase of the collision energy, elastic photoproduction of $rho$ mesons on nuclei becomes affected by the significant cross section of photon inelastic diffraction into large masses, which results in the sizable inelastic nuclear shadowing correction to $sigma_{gamma A to rho A}$ and the reduced effective $rho$-nucleon cross section. We take these effects into account by combining the vector meson dominance model, which we upgrade to include the contribution of high-mass fluctuations of the photon according to QCD constraints, and the Gribov-Glauber approximation for nuclear shadowing, where the inelastic nuclear shadowing is included by means of cross section fluctuations. The resulting approach allows us to successfully describe the data on elastic $rho$ photoproduction on nuclei in heavy ion UPCs in the $7 {rm GeV} < W_{gamma p} < 46$ GeV energy range and to predict the value of the cross section of coherent $rho$ photoproduction in Pb-Pb UPCs at $sqrt{s_{NN}}=5.02$ TeV in Run 2 at the LHC, $dsigma_{Pb Pb to rho Pb Pb} (y=0)/dy= 560 pm 25$ mb.
Coherent photoproduction of $eta$-mesons off $^3$He, i.e. the reaction $gamma ^3{He}rightarrow eta ^3{He}$, has been investigated in the near-threshold region. The experiment was performed at the Glasgow tagged photon facility of the Mainz MAMI accelerator with the combined Crystal Ball - TAPS detector. Angular distributions and the total cross section were measured using the $etarightarrow gammagamma$ and $etarightarrow 3pi^0rightarrow 6gamma$ decay channels. The observed extremely sharp rise of the cross section at threshold and the behavior of the angular distributions are evidence for a strong $eta {^3{He}}$ final state interaction, pointing to the existence of a resonant state. The search for further evidence of this state in the excitation function of $pi^0$-proton back-to-back emission in the $gamma ^3{He}rightarrow pi^0 pX$ reaction revealed a very complicated structure of the background and could not support previous conclusions.
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