Prompt photon production in high-energy $pA$ collisions at forward rapidity

TL;DR

This paper investigates prompt photon production in high-energy proton-nucleus collisions using the QCD color dipole approach, comparing predictions with experimental data and exploring the scaling behavior.

Contribution

It applies the QCD color dipole formalism to predict nuclear modification factors and analyze scaling, providing new insights into prompt photon production at RHIC and LHC energies.

Findings

Model predictions agree with PHENIX, ATLAS, and ALICE data.

The $x_T$-scaling observed in data is explained by the formalism.

Nuclear modification factors show saturation effects at high energies.

Abstract

Prompt photon production in hadronic collisions at the RHIC and the LHC energies is investigated within the QCD color dipole approach. Predictions for the nuclear modification factor in $pA$ collisions are evaluated based on parton saturation framework and the results are compared to the experimental measurements as a function of the photon transverse momentum at different rapidity bins. The reliability of the models is performed with the data from PHENIX, ATLAS, and ALICE Collaborations. Moreover, we show that the observed $x_T$-scaling of prompt photon production in $pp$ and $pA$ collisions can positively be addressed in the QCD color dipole formalism.