Heavy flavour production in pp collisions and intrinsic quark components in proton

TL;DR

This paper explores how LHC data on forward heavy flavour hadron production can reveal intrinsic heavy quark components in the proton, providing new insights into proton structure and predictions for meson production at various energies.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of D-meson production including intrinsic charm and predicts K-meson production considering intrinsic strangeness in the proton.

Findings

Intrinsic charm affects D-meson production at LHC.

Predictions for K-meson production at 158 GeV and 7 TeV.

Potential verification in NA61 and LHC experiments.

Abstract

The LHC data on the forward heavy flavour hadron production can be a new unique source for estimation of intrinsic heavy quark contributions to the proton. We discuss in detail the D-meson production in pp collisions at the LHC including the intrinsic charm in the proton. We present also some predictions for the K-meson production in the pp collision at the initial energies 158 GeV and 7 TeV made within the perturbative QCD including the intrinsic strangeness in the proton that can be verified in the NA61 experiment and at LHC.