Physics Potential of the CMS CASTOR Forward Calorimeter

TL;DR

The CMS CASTOR forward calorimeter enhances the LHC's ability to study forward physics phenomena, including low-x QCD, diffraction, and cosmic rays, by providing detailed shower profiles and particle separation in the very forward region.

Contribution

This paper summarizes the physics potential and capabilities of the CMS CASTOR calorimeter for forward physics studies at the LHC.

Findings

Enables detailed shower profile reconstruction.

Allows separation of electrons, photons, and hadrons.

Supports studies of low-x parton dynamics and diffractive scattering.

Abstract

The CASTOR calorimeter is a detector covering the very forward region of the CMS experiment at the LHC. It surrounds the beam pipe with 14 longitudinal modules each of which consisting of 16 azimuthal sectors and allows to reconstruct shower profiles, separate electrons and photons from hadrons and search for phenomena with anomalous hadronic energy depositions. The physics program that can be performed with this detector includes a large variety of different QCD topics. In particular, the calorimeter is supposed to contribute to studies of low-x parton dynamics, diffractive scattering, multi-parton interactions and cosmic ray related physics in proton-proton and heavy-ion collisions. The physics capabilities of this detector are briefly summarized in this paper.