Coherent photoproduction of $\psi$ and $\Upsilon$ mesons in ultraperipheral pPb and PbPb collisions at the CERN LHC

TL;DR

This paper calculates the cross sections and rapidity distributions of various vector mesons produced in ultraperipheral pPb and PbPb collisions at the LHC, exploring gluon shadowing effects and nuclear gluon modifications.

Contribution

It provides detailed predictions for vector meson production in ultraperipheral collisions, incorporating gluon shadowing effects to help constrain nuclear gluon distributions.

Findings

Cross sections and rapidity distributions for multiple mesons are calculated.

Gluon shadowing effects significantly influence the production rates.

Potential to constrain nuclear gluon modifications at the LHC.

Abstract

Exclusive photoproduction of vector mesons in the perturbative two-gluon exchange formalism depends significantly on nucleon and nuclear gluon distributions. In the present study we calculate total cross sections and rapidity distributions of $J/\psi(1s)$, $\psi(2s)$, $\Upsilon(1s)$, $\Upsilon(2s)$, and $\Upsilon(3s)$ in ultraperipheral proton-lead (pPb) and lead-lead (PbPb) collisions at the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at $\sqrt{s_{_{NN}}}=5$ TeV and $\sqrt{s_{_{NN}}}=2.76$ TeV respectively. Effects of gluon shadowing are investigated and potentials for constraining nuclear gluon modifications are discussed.