J. Cheng

K(892)* resonance production in Au+Au and p+p collisions at sqrt(sNN) = 200 GeV at RHIC

Author(s): Adams, J.; Aggarwal, M.M.; Ahammed, Z.; Amonett, J.; Anderson, B.D.; Arkhipkin, D.; Averichev, G.S.; Badyal, S.K.; Bai, Y.; Balewski, J.; Barannikova, O.; Barnby, L.S.; Baudot, J.; Bekele, S.; Belaga, V.V.; Bellwied, R.; Berger, J.; Bezverkhny, B.I.; Bharadwaj, S.; Bhasin, A.; Bhati, A.K.; Bhatia, V.S.; Bichsel, H.; Billmeier, A.; Bland, L.C.; Blyth, C.O.; Bonner, B.E.; Botje, M.; Boucham, A.; Brandin, A.V.; Bravar, A.; Bystersky, M.; Cadman, R.V.; Cai, X.Z.; Caines, H.; Calderon de la Barca Sanchez, M.; Castillo, J.; Cebra, D.; Chajecki, Z.; Chaloupka, P.; Chattopadhyay, S.; Chen, H.F.; Chen, Y.; Cheng, J.; Cherney, M.; Chikanian, A.; Christie, W.; Coffin, J.P.; Cormier, T.M.; Cramer, J.G.; Crawford, H.J.; Das, D.; Das, S.; de Moura, M.M.; Derevschikov, A.A.; Didenko, L.; Dietel, T.; Dogra, S.M.; Dong, W.J.; Dong, X.; Draper, J.E.; Du, F.; Dubey, A.K.; Dunin, V.B.; Dunlop, J.C.; Dutta Mazumdar, M.R.; Eckardt, V.; Edwards, W.R.; Efimov, L.G.; Emelianov, V.; Engelage, J.; Eppley, G.; Erazmus, B.; Estienne, M.; Fachini, P.; Faivre, J.; Fatemi, R.; Fedorisin, J.; Filimonov, K.; Filip, P.; Finch, E.; Fine, V.; Fisyak, Y.; Fomenko, K.; Fu, J.The short-lived K(892)* resonance provides an efficient tool to probe properties of the hot and dense medium produced in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We report measurements of K* in root s(NN)=200 GeV Au+Au and p+p collisions reconstructed via its hadronic decay channels K(892)*(0)-> K pi and K(892)*(+/-)-> K(S)(0)pi(+/-) using the STAR detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The K*(0) mass has been studied as a function of p(T) in minimum bias p+p and central Au+Au collisions. The K(*) p(T) spectra for minimum bias p+p interactions and for Au+Au collisions in different centralities are presented. The K*/K yield ratios for all centralities in Au+Au collisions are found to be significantly lower than the ratio in minimum bias p+p collisions, indicating the importance of hadronic interactions between chemical and kinetic freeze-outs. A significant nonzero K*(0) elliptic flow (v(2)) is observed in Au+Au collisions and is compared to the K(S)(0) and Lambda v(2). The nuclear modification factor of K* at intermediate p(T) is similar to that of K(S)(0) but different from Lambda. This establishes a baryon-meson effect over a mass effect in the particle production at intermediate p(T) (2 < p(T)<= 4 GeV/c).

Calibration and performance of the STAR Muon Telescope Detector using cosmic rays

We report the timing and spatial resolution from the Muon Telescope Detector (MTD) installed in the STAR experiment at RHIC. Cosmic ray muons traversing the STAR detector have an average transverse momentum of 6 GeV/c. Due to their very small multiple scattering, these cosmic muons provide an ideal tool to calibrate the detectors and measure their timing and spatial resolution. The values obtained were ∼100 ps and ∼1-2 cm, respectively. These values are comparable to those obtained from cosmic-ray bench tests and test beams.

Study on high rate MRPC for high luminosity experiments

Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPC) has been used to construct time-of-flight system in the field of nuclear and particle physics, due to their high-precision timing properties, high efficiency, reliability and coverage of large area. With the increase of accelerator luminosity, MRPCs have to withstand particle fluxes up to several tens of kHz/cm2 in view of the next generation physics experiments, such as the SIS-100/300 at FAIR-CBM, SoLID at JLab and NICA at JINR. But the MRPC assembled with float glass has very low rate capability not exceeding some hundreds of Hz/cm2. Two possible solutions for increasing rate capability, one is to reduce the bulk resistivity of glass and the other is to reduce the electrode thickness. Tsinghua University has done R&D on high rate MRPC for many years. A special low resistive glass with bulk resistivity around 1010Ω.cm was developed. We also studied the rate capability changes with glass thickness. In this paper we describe the performance of low resistive glass and two kinds of high rate MRPC (Pad readout and Strip readout) tested by deuterium beams. The results show that the tolerable particle flux can reach 70 kHz/cm2. In the mean time, MRPCs assembled with three thickness (0.7 mm, 0.5 mm and 0.35 mm) of float glass were also tested with deuteron beams, the results show that the three detectors can afford particle rate up to 500 Hz/cm2, 0.75 kHz/cm2 and 3 kHz/cm2, respectively.

The CBM Time-of-Flight wall — a conceptual design

Charged hadron identification in the Compressed Baryonic Matter experiment (CBM) is realized via the Time-of-Flight method [1]. For this purpose the CBM-ToF collaboration designed a Time-of-Flight wall composed of Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chambers (MRPCs). Due to the high interaction rate in CBM of 10 MHz the key challenge is the development of high rate MRPCs above 25 kHz/cm2 which become possible after the development of low resistive glass with extremely good quality. In this article we present the actual conceptual design of the ToF-wall which is subdivided in three parts namely the outer wall, the inner wall and the forward zone that are discussed in detail.

A high time and spatial resolution MRPC designed for muon tomography

A prototype of cosmic muon scattering tomography system has been set up in Tsinghua University in Beijing. Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chamber (MRPC) is used in the system to get the muon tracks. Compared with other detectors, MRPC can not only provide the track but also the Time of Flight (ToF) between two detectors which can estimate the energy of particles. To get a more accurate track and higher efficiency of the tomography system, a new type of high time and two-dimensional spatial resolution MRPC has been developed. A series of experiments have been done to measure the efficiency, time resolution and spatial resolution. The results show that the efficiency can reach 95% and its time resolution is around 65 ps. The cluster size is around 4 and the spatial resolution can reach 200 μ m.

Elliptic flow of identified hadrons in Au+Au collisions at √sNN=7.7–62.4 GeV

Measurements of the elliptic flow, upsilon(2), of identified hadrons (pi(+/-), K-+/-, K-s(0), p, (p) over bar, phi, Lambda, (Lambda) over bar, Xi(-), (Xi) over bar (+), Omega(-), (Omega) over bar (+)) in Au + Au collisions at root s(NN) = 7.7, 11.5, 19.6, 27, 39, and 62.4 GeV are presented. The measurements were done at midrapidity using the time-projection chamber and the time-of-flight detectors of the Solenoidal Tracker at RHIC experiment during the beam-energy scan program at Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. A significant difference in the upsilon(2) values for particles and the corresponding antiparticles was observed at all transverse momenta for the first time. The difference increases with decreasing center-of-mass energy, root s(NN) (or increasing baryon chemical potential, mu(B)), and is larger for the baryons as compared to the mesons. This implies that particles and antiparticles are no longer consistent with the universal number-of-constituent quark (NCQ) scaling of upsilon(2) that was observed at root s(NN) = 200 GeV. However, for the selected group of particles (p(+), K+, K-s(0), p, Lambda, Xi(-), Omega(-)) NCQ scaling at (m(T) - m(0))/n(q) > 0.4 GeV/c(2) is not violated within +/- 10%. The upsilon(2) values for f mesons at 7.7 and 11.5 GeV are approximately two standard deviations from the trend defined by the other hadrons at the highest measured p(T) values.

Aging test of a real-size high rate MRPC for CBM-TOF wall

A new kind of low-resistivity glass has been developed. Its volume resistivity is on the order of 1010 Ω cm and multi-gap resistive plate chambers (MRPCs), once assembled with it, can be operated at a charged particle flux in excess of 25 kHz/cm2, with very small charge build-up at the plates. This new technology has a wide range of application in high energy physics experiments such as FAIR-CBM, LHC-ATLAS or Jlab-SOLID, to mention some. In this paper we report on results related to its long-term behavior (aging). A 6 × 2-pad CBM module has been irradiated by X-rays at a mips-equivalent flux of 15 kHz/cm2, for 300 hours and for a released charge totaling 0.22 C (50 mC/cm2). Tested in an electron beam before and after exposure, no degradation of the detector performances could be appreciated. As expected, compared to common glass MRPCs, the newly developed high rate counter also responds faster to sudden irradiation.

Production of long-strip multi-gap resistive plate chamber module for the STAR-MTD system

A new Long-strip Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chamber (LMRPC) prototype with 5 gas gaps has been developed for the Muon Telescope Detector (MTD) of the STAR experiment at RHIC in order to reduce the working High Voltage (HV) of previous design. Technical specifications related to the final infrastructure present in the experiment have motivated this effort. Its performance has been measured with cosmic rays. The efficiency of this prototype can reach 98% and the time resolution is around 95 ps. It shows a good uniformity among strips. The noise level is less than 0.2 Hz/cm2. The signal transmission and crosstalk of the modules was measured with a vector network analyzer, showing a good match with simulations within the amplifier bandwidth. A new cosmic-ray test system with long scintillators has been developed to accelerate the Quality Control (QC) process during the mass production of STAR-MTD. A selection of perpendicular cosmic-ray events for more accurate evaluation of the time resolution is achieved. The time resolution with this method is better, albeit with larger error, than the result obtained without any selection. A new spacer is used, resulting in a much reduced streamer ratio at comparable fields. Thirty-two modules have been built with the new spacer by the middle of April of 2012. They have been tested and they all have passed the QC.

Implications for new physics from B¯0→π0π0 and B¯0→K¯0K0

We have analyzed the (B) over bar (0) -> pi(0)pi(0) puzzle in three kinds of models beyond the standard model (SM). It is shown that the minimal flavor violation (MFV) models, the minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM), and the two Higgs doublet models (2HDM) I and II cannot give an explanation of the (B) over bar (0) -> pi(0)pi(0) puzzle within la experimental bounds and the model III 2HDM can explain the puzzle without a conflict with other experimental measurements. If the constraint on C-8g from b -> sg is not imposed, for all kinds of insertions considered there are regions of parameter space, where the scalar quark mass is larger (much larger) than the gluino mass in the case of LR or RL (LL or RR), in which the puzzle can be resolved within 1 sigma experimental bounds. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A realistic design of the CBM-TOF wall based on modules commissioned in-beam

The Compressed Baryonic Matter experiment at the future Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research will use a time-of-flight (TOF) wall for hadron identification, which is at the moment planned to be based on the Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chamber (MRPC) technology. The wall will be placed at 10m distance from the target, covering an area of the order of 150 m2. Over such an area, it will provide a time-of-flight resolution of 80 ps, by resorting to ca. 50000 RPC cells (in multi-strip or multi-pad configuration). Fluxes of quasi-minimum ionizing particles (γβ≥3) as high as 20 kHz/cm2 can be reached in the central region, corresponding to the low polar angle/high rapidity section. We propose here a realistic design for building the TOF wall by resorting to a single technology based on low-resistivity doped glass and relying on small structural modifications of the modules developed and tested during the last two years. Latest results from the modules are summarized. A comprehensive analytic discussion on the counter performance under non-uniform beams, when neglecting non-local effects, is also presented.