Particle production in p-p collisions at sqrt(s) = 17 GeV within the statistical model

TL;DR

This paper uses a thermal model to analyze particle production in proton-proton collisions at 17 GeV, examining how model parameters depend on data and assumptions, and comparing with heavy-ion collisions.

Contribution

It provides a detailed thermal-model analysis of p-p collisions at 17 GeV, highlighting sensitivities and system-size effects, and discusses recent differences in statistical model results.

Findings

Temperature and strangeness parameters depend on kaon yields.

It is unlikely that p-p collision temperature exceeds that of heavy-ion collisions.

Model parameters are sensitive to data selection and assumptions.

Abstract

A thermal-model analysis of particle production of p-p collisions at sqrt(s) = 17 GeV using the latest available data is presented. The sensitivity of model parameters on data selections and model assumptions is studied. The system-size dependence of thermal parameters and recent differences in the statistical model analysis of p-p collisions at the super proton synchrotron (SPS) are discussed. It is shown that the temperature and strangeness undersaturation factor depend strongly on kaon yields which at present are still not well known experimentally. It is conclude, that within the presently available data at the SPS it is rather unlikely that the temperature in p-p collisions exceeds significantly that expected in central collisions of heavy ions at the same energy.