NA61 experiment

Physics program

The NA61/SHINE physics program has been designed to measure hadron production in three different types of collisions:

• In nucleus–nucleus (heavy ion) collisions, in particular the measurement of fluctuations and long range correlations, with the aim to identify the properties of the onset of deconfinement and find evidence for the critical point of strongly interacting matter.
• In proton–proton and proton–nucleus interactions needed as reference data for better understanding of nucleus–nucleus reactions; in particular with regards to correlations, fluctuations and high transverse momenta.
• In hadron–nucleus interactions needed for neutrino (T2K, NOvA and future DUNE) and cosmic-ray experiments (Pierre Auger Observatory and KASCADE).

Detector

The NA61/SHINE experiment uses a large acceptance hadron spectrometer located on the H2 beam line in the North Area of CERN. It consist of components used by the heavy ion NA49 experiment as well as those designed and constructed for NA61/SHINE. |display-authors=etal

The main tracking devices are four large volume time projection chambers (TPCs), which are capable of detecting up to 70% of all charged particles created in the studied reactions. Two of them are located in the magnetic field of two super-conducting dipole magnets with maximum bending powers of 9 tesla meters. Two others are positioned downstream of the magnets symmetrically with respect to the beam line. Additionally, four small volume TPCs placed directly along the beamline region are used in case of hadron and light ion beams. |display-authors=etal

The setup is supplemented by time of flight detector walls, which extend particle identification to low momenta (

Collected data

Extended program: after [[Large Hadron Collider#Long Shutdown 2 (2018–2022)|Long Shutdown 2]]

In 2018 the NA61/SHINE collaboration published an addendum presenting an intent to upgrade the experimental facility and perform a new set of measurements after Long Shutdown 2. |display-authors=etal

The heavy ions program will focus on study of charm hadron production (mostly D mesons) in lead-lead interactions.

In 2020 the SPS and PS Experiments Committee (SPSC) recommended approval of beam time in 2021.

References

References

1. "History of the Collaboration {{!}} The NA61/SHINE experiment".
2. Aduszkiewicz, A.. (4 October 2017). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS".
3. Aduszkiewicz, A.. (8 October 2016). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS".
4. (2019-12-11). "Measurements of hadron production in π⁺+C and π⁺+Be interactions at 60 GeV/''c''". Physical Review D.
5. (2019-12-02). "Measurements of production and inelastic cross sections for p+C, p+Be, and p+Al at 60 GeV/''c'' and p+C and p+Be at 120 GeV/''c''". Physical Review D.
6. (2018-09-10). "Measurements of total production cross sections for π⁺+C, π⁺+Al, K⁺+C, and K⁺+Al at 60 GeV/''c'' and π⁺+C and π⁺+Al at 31 GeV/''c''". Physical Review D.
7. (2019-03-28). "Study of pion kaon and proton in proton–carbon interactions at 158 GeV/ c using hadron production models". Modern Physics Letters A.
8. (May 2020). "K^∗(892)⁰ meson production in inelastic p+p interactions at 158 GeV/''c'' beam momentum measured by NA61/SHINE at the CERN SPS". The European Physical Journal C.
9. (2020). "The XVIII International Conference on Strangeness in Quark Matter (SQM 2019)".
10. (March 2014). "Measurement of negatively charged pion spectra in inelastic p+p interactions at ''p''_lab = 20, 31, 40, 80 and 158 GeV/c". The European Physical Journal C.
11. (2019). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS".
12. (November 2016). "Measurements of π^± differential yields from the surface of the T2K replica target for incoming 31 GeV/c protons with the NA61/SHINE spectrometer at the CERN SPS". The European Physical Journal C.
13. (2006). "Measurement of the production cross-section of positive pions in p–Al collisions at". Nuclear Physics B.
14. (2015). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment".
15. (2013). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS".
16. (2020). "European Physical Society Conference on High Energy Physics (EPS-HEP2019)".
17. (October 2020). "Measurements of π⁻ production in ⁷Be + ⁹Be collisions at beam momenta from 19''A'' to 150''A'' GeV/''c'' in the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS". The European Physical Journal C.
18. (2017). "Pion Spectra in Ar+Sc Interactions at SPS Energies". Acta Physica Polonica B Proceedings Supplement.
19. (May 2021). "Spectra and mean multiplicities of π⁻ in central ⁴⁰Ar + ⁴⁵Sc collisions at 13''A'', 19''A'', 30''A'', 40''A'', 75''A'' and 150''A'' GeV/''c'' beam momenta measured by the NA61/SHINE spectrometer at the CERN SPS". The European Physical Journal C.
20. (2018). "Report from the NA61/SHINE experiment at the CERN SPS".
21. (December 2020). "Directed flow measurement in Pb+Pb collisions at p lab = 13 A GeV/c collected with NA61/SHINE at SPS". Journal of Physics: Conference Series.
22. (2008-06-30). "Bose-Einstein correlations of π − π − pairs in central Pb+Pb collisions at 20 A, 30 A, 40 A, 80 A, and 158 A GeV". Physical Review C.