Measurement of antiproton production in ${\rm p He}$ collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=110$ GeV

TL;DR

This paper reports the first direct measurement of antiproton production cross-section in proton-helium collisions at 110 GeV, providing crucial data for understanding cosmic ray antiprotons and astrophysical phenomena.

Contribution

It presents the first direct measurement of antiproton production in p-He collisions at 110 GeV, using LHCb with helium gas injection, filling a key gap in cosmic ray physics data.

Findings

Measured antiproton production cross-section for 12-110 GeV/c momenta.

First direct determination of p-He antiproton production cross-section.

Results impact interpretation of cosmic ray antiproton data.

Abstract

The cross-section for prompt antiproton production in collisions of protons with an energy of $6.5$ TeV incident on helium nuclei at rest is measured with the LHCb experiment from a data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of $0.5\,nb^{-1}$. The target is provided by injecting helium gas into the LHC beam line at the LHCb interaction point. The reported results, covering antiproton momenta between $12$ and $110\,\mathrm{GeV/}c$, represent the first direct determination of the antiproton production cross-section in ${\rm p He}$ collisions, and impact the interpretation of recent results on antiproton cosmic rays from space-borne experiments.