On strangeness in NA61/SHINE

TL;DR

This paper reviews recent measurements of strangeness production in various collision systems at CERN's SPS, aiming to understand the properties of strongly interacting matter and the onset of deconfinement.

Contribution

It provides new experimental data on kaon spectra and multiplicities across different collision systems and energies, highlighting system size effects near the phase transition.

Findings

Strangeness production varies with system size and energy.

Kaon spectra and multiplicities show signs of the onset of deconfinement.

Results contribute to locating the QCD critical point.

Abstract

NA61/SHINE is a fixed target experiment at the CERN Super-Proton- Synchrotron. The main goals of the experiment are to discover the critical point of strongly interacting matter and to study the properties of the onset of deconfinement. In order to reach these goals, a study of hadron production properties is performed in nucleus-nucleus, proton-proton and proton-nucleus interactions as a function of collision energy and size of the colliding nuclei. In this paper, I will review recent results on strangeness production in p+p, Be+Be and Ar+Sc collisions in the SPS energy range. Kinematic spectra and mean multiplicities of kaons obtained with various analysis methods will be shown. An overview of strangeness production and its dependence on system size in the vicinity of the phase transition will be presented as well.